Touch the Air Softly
by Jessa L'Rynn
Summary: COMPLETE! This is a love story, based on the possibility that bright love can save a dark heart and young love can win even a heart both old and shattered.
1. Chapter 1: However is Ever

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 1: However is ever**

Albus Dumbledore looked morosely around the room. "My hand is bleeding," he muttered to the Hogwarts instructors seated around him.

"It's your own fault, you old fool," Severus Snape muttered darkly, and twisted in his chair, trying to get a look without anyone actually catching on.

Minerva McGonagall sighed. "I'm never sure what to do with all these little inscriptions, anyway," she said gloomily.

Filius Flitwick's little voice chirped, "It's simple enough, Minerva - you just need to concentrate and everything will fall into place."

Snape snorted, McGonagall sighed again.

Professor Sprout inserted, "They're not inscriptions, they're old symbols. Muggles have been using them for centuries."

Madam Hooch said, "Gin."

Sybill Trelawney's mystical voice floated majestically across the table. "I knew that would happen," she said. When they all looked at her with their customary expressions, ranging from skepticism to downright disgust, she continued, "This is going to be an interesting evening for all of us."

"I'll pass," growled Snape as he collected the cards. "Interesting evenings can wait for some other time when I've not imbibed so much alcohol. Who's deal is it?"

"I dealt last, of course," said Dumbledore calmly, "as you so politely reminded me when I complained of what had been given. I believe that makes it your turn."

"The evening will be most interesting for you, Severus," said Trelawney warningly.

Snape looked at McGonagall and they both rolled their eyes. Dealing carefully from the bottom of the deck, Snape passed himself a perfect hand. He suspected Flitwick had caught him, but also knew that the tiny Charms professor was too kind to suggest anything, even though it was exactly what any Slytherin would do.

A small crystaline talisman hanging on the wall behind Dumbledore slowly began to brighten, then sparkle, and finally started to turn until it was flashing prismatic rays over the table and the cards.

McGonagall picked up her mug and drained it. "Well, it happens every year," she said with a sigh.

Dumbledore was the one to roll his eyes this time. Madam Hooch glared viciously at the pretty little thing, as Trelawney smiled with triumph next too her. Dumbledore reached over his shoulder to see whose it was while Snape frowned at his cards and tried to ignore the little crystal. He knew what it was, everyone in the room knew what it was. He rather thought they ought to get on with the game and leave the idiot crystal until later. He poured himself another drink and sipped at it while Dumbledore stared at talisman and read it carefully for the information that it could impart to him alone.

"It seems," the ancient Headmaster said with a twinkle in his eye, "that it may not manifest for several months. We should have plenty of warning." He turned grimly back to the wall.

"Oh, who is it, Albus?" McGonagall demanded.

Dumbledore nodded, the gesture he always made to admit that he had forgotten something - which of course he hadn't, but he'd wanted really to spare whomever the public revelation.

"I hope it's not me," said Madame Hooch.

"It was last year," said Sprout teasingly.

Madam Hooch glared at her.

Dumbledore held the crystal tightly in his hand, concealing it completely from sight for the moment. "It hasn't been me since 1974," said McGonagall, "so I hope I can be spared another year."

"It's never been me," Snape commented leisurely, shuffling the cards in his hand back and forth.

Dumbledore looked at him with sympathetic eyes. "Then you'll be happy to know that it is you, this time," he said merrily.

Snape drained his drink. "Delightful," he deadpanned, and laid his cards on the table. It didn't matter, since they weren't the ones he dealt himself. While he was pouring his drink and not paying attention, a certain someone had arranged for him to get the ones he was supposed to have. He glared at Dumbledore. "If you'll excuse me, Head Master," he said, "I've left a potion brewing."

"Of course, Severus," he said, though it was plain that he would be down to talk later. Snape immediately resolved to be elsewhere.

McGonagall looked up from her cards. "If you need me to talk to anyone, Severus, let me know, please," she said.

Snape nodded, genuinely appreciating this offer but utterly unwilling to express it. He closed the door behind him but could not shield out the last few words of the conversation.

"It usually comes to nothing, of course," said Sprout, stirring her drink slowly with a tiny, badger-topped stir stick.

"It's just as well, though, that you have the thing," said Minerva. "Even if it did go off every fifteen minutes when Lockhart was here."

"I thought it best to allow the professors a foreknowledge of the scenario," said Dumbledore. "It seemed safest rather than have someone as astonished as poor Professor Quickney was that first year I taught here."

"They're just children, true, and it can surprise you when one of them starts admiring you a little too much," said McGonagall.

"I think poor, dear Severus will be quite pleased with the revelation," said Trelawney.

Hooch drained her drink. "I can't quite believe it myself. What girl would be..."she stopped at the look on Dumbledore's face. "Redeal?" she asked.

That had been four years ago, several hours following the maddening events of the Arrival Feast, and no one had since given indication to be the girl who tripped Dumbledore's "Juvenile Crush" alarm. Snape always assumed that, whoever she was, she'd turned her attentions to a more healthy candidate and finished her schooling and moved on. The next year, however, the crystal had stayed lit for him, but it had also started up for Madame Hooch, again, whom he felt deserved it for the snide comment he'd later heard her making to Sprout in the corridor.

Even if she was right. Even if he was a cold and cynical, calculating bastard who might just hurt the child if she did ever turn up.

Assuming it was a girl, he amended.

He was only thinking about it tonight because, for the first time in four years, the crystal had gone out in his presence. It would have made sense if it had stopped glowing at the end of last year, assuming maybe that the girl had left the school. It was the middle of September, though, and that struck him as strange.

Though he was sure that she'd finally found someone her own age to bestow her infatuation upon.

Though it seemed odd that four years of fidelity had suddenly stopped.

He'd become accustomed to the knowledge that the unknown female was attracted to him. It didn't effect his actions, or his words, but there was something a little compelling about the idea. In a world where everything he did and said was dangerous, where he was unsure of seeing the next sunset on most occasions, where trouble and nightmares lay around every corner, it was almost comforting to know that one girl, even if she was a child by wizarding standards, cared whether he lived or died.


	2. Chapter 2: Step Gently

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter Two: Step Gently**

It had started out innocently enough. They had talked about everything they had seen over the summer, the Dark Mark, the Death Eaters at the Quidditch cup. They had talked about the new DADA professor and his weird eye. They had talked about every boy they knew and how the summer holidays didn't seem to have changed him one bit. And still Hermione Granger wasn't sleepy and still Ginny Weasley had wanted to know more. Things the boys wouldn't tell her - Ron because he was Ron, and Harry because - well, because he was Harry.

So they talked about a muggle summer, and Harry's suspicions, and Dumbledore's concurrence, though Hermione refused to say how she knew that. Then, when Hermione's refusal led Ginny to the next topic, they talked about the end of last year. It had seemed weird to Ginny - she was suspicious. She demanded, at last, to know what had happened that night in the forbidden forest.

So Hermione told her everything. Almost everything. She didn't mention the time turner, the only thing that had saved an innocent man from a fate literally worse than death. She didn't tell her about Harry's godfather, Ron's rat, and how a supposedly dead man had managed to hide under Ginny's parents' noses for years. Ginny didn't need that, righteously suspicious creature that she was.

But she did tell her about Lupin and his lycanthropy. She did tell her about Harry saving them all from dementors. They were girlish and silly, fawning over Ron's bravery and Harry's, impressed in spite of themselves, though Hermione had been in the middle of it, just as well. And then, on that topic, the thing that had hung in her mind all summer, worrying her, bothering her, making her doubt herself as things rarely did, eventually came out.

She had a crush on Ron - had always had one, for as long as she could remember. Ron at been the one to rescue her from a full grown mountain troll. Well, but Harry had helped, but it was impossible for Hermione to imagine having a crush on Harry. She tried to explain this to Ginny - that liking Harry struck her as something somewhere between trying to catch a myth and incest. Ginny, of course, couldn't fathom it - Harry's myth was still all too real to her then.

She had always thought Ron impossibly brave and selfless - he wasn't mythic and he tried to keep up. But that awful night, in the black and deadly forest, in the face of something horrifying, someone else had registered that way too, someone who had come out into the night, on a full moon, with a full grown werewolf and a convict on the loose, come out to rescue students he hated. She knew - KNEW - in her mind and in her instinct, that his motives were anything but noble. Yet she could only see the look on his face "Be silent, Miss Granger, for once in your life," and it had haunted her.

That had been four years ago, after the arrival feast, and she had yet to come forward or say anything. She was thinking about it tonight because it was her birthday and, instead of spending her time with her friends at the party they had thrown her in the common room, she was sitting on the library steps, wondering what she needed to do with her life.

She thought she'd do her best and blame the thing on McGonagall. It seemed most sensible, since it was McGonagall who had brought the subject up in the first place. A young and charming witch with the highest marks and her choice of the best possible futures ahead of her, what would Hermione expect after her last year at Hogwarts?

Nothing, Hermione had thought, thanking her head of house politely and smilingly moving on.

The truth was that, although Harry and Ron had seemed to find what they were looking for in their futures, she remained bleak and uncertain. Well, Harry was bleak and uncertain most of the time, too, so she felt she had some right to her worrying. What would become of Hermione Granger, book worm, know-it-all, and brain, if you took school and friends away from her? Over the years, she had come to think of herself this way - Harry and Ron's friend, Hagrid's defender, McGonagall's pet. Head-girl and, lately, grouch, she had no certain idea.

Then, she could also blame Ron for this. Ron, who had suddenly noticed the girl who had been desperate for him since he met her in fifth year. Ron, who had decided that it was easier to love a dreamy girl with an amazing mind, than a dream girl with an amazing mind. Those had been his words over the summer. They'd both cried, they both apologized. They were both sorry. Harry was relieved as he sat there, awkward, involuntary witness to what everyone was sure would be the worst breakup of the century. But the truth was that, although Hermione loved Ron, she desperately wanted him to be happy and she would have bet all the galleons in Harry's vault that she would never quite manage it.

She had another interest.

It was only a small one, but she had it.

Her mind had long since told her that every adolescent girl in the entire world eventually fell in love with someone wildly inappropriate, someone wrong for her, someone who would hurt her or couldn't be bothered or someone who would take advantage. Someone she had no business thinking about. Her mind told her that it was her hormones and an idiot infantile crush. It supplied almost all the answers, including the fact that any girl with a mind like hers was bound to go for someone older, someone wiser and more mature, someone whose mind appealed more than his body. Someone bad for her. But it didn't have one answer. How was she, 18 now and full grown by a year, to escape it, when the adolescent fascination hadn't bothered to go away?

Because it wasn't a crush anymore.

Checking Hermione's birthday in September and not knowing wizard rules about it, and being nervous, I went ahead and assumed that she started Hogwarts when she was almost 12, as opposed to almost 11.

_**I'm sorry this one's short! What do you think? I'd love to hear! Thanks!**_


	3. Chapter 3: Gravel for Bread

A/N: Enough with the exposition, already. :-) This chapter will move into the actual action of the piece. If you like to laugh, I recommend it. Thanks SO MUCH for the reviews – you give me the courage to continue. Oh, and if you don't know who Ron's new love is, it'll become plain in the next chapter. I've also had it pointed out that Hermione may have been referred to as the youngest of the trio, in which case she turned 17 instead of 18. Still, she's an adult now by wizarding standards, even if she is a rather young one. Anyway, this is the where the story, proper, begins.

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 3: Gravel for Bread**

Hermione stared at the notice McGonagall was circulating in their transfiguration class with horror. Harry looked up at her from the next desk, his face the very picture of shock. Ron, whom she handed the paper to next, turned red at the ears and hastily flung the thing onto Lavender's desk, and tried to hide behind his books. Hermione heard giggling coming from the next people to get the paper, followed by Neville Longbottom dropping all his books on the floor.

"I guess Lord Voldemort wasn't enough trouble for me to worry about," Harry whispered. Hermione smiled, but stopped suddenly when McGonagall raised her head from her notes.

"Oh, for pity's sake!" their head of house snapped. "There is no need to get so worked up about it. This class will be just like any other during your wizarding education - except that you might need this one even more." The boys exchanged grins at each other over Hermione's head. She snorted.

"Five points from Gryffindor, Ms. Granger," said McGonagall. "I suppose, as usual, you have already read all the material?"

"No, Professor," Hermione said, softly.

"Then do not presume that you do not need the class." She turned the weight of her glare into the rest of the class and Hermione turned hers onto Ron and Harry in turn. "It will be on Thursday evenings at 7 o'clock in the larger History of Magic classroom, as it will be a lecture class. You will need to each acquire a copy of 'The Most Ancient Magic by Hortense Freemore' from the bookstore on your next Hogsmeade visit, which is the weekend before the class begins." She looked around the room. "Yes, Mr. Finnigan?" she asked resignedly.

"Um," he began, flustered, "um, is it just going to be us in the class, Professor? I mean, not the S... other houses?"

She frowned. "You will be studying with Ravenclaw," she said. "The earlier class will be attended by Hufflepuff and Slytherin."

"Poor Hufflepuff," Ron whispered.

She caught him. "Yes, Mr. Weasley? What was your question?"

Ron turned completely red, this time, absolutely caught off guard. "You're teaching the class, right?" he said, for the sake of something to say.

"It is irrelevant to my subject," she said. "And, unfortunately, neither Madam Pomfrey nor Professor Flitwick are available for the whole time, so could not take the class."

Hermione stared at her in horror. She had told McGonagall the truth - the subject might have been one she was vaguely interested in on an intellectual level, but she hadn't had the nerve to pursue it. Nevertheless, she knew what McGonagall was telling them. There was only one other topic in the school that approached this subject, and therefore only one other professor.

"I'm sure you will find Professor Snape to be both informative and instructive."

Harry groaned. McGonagall smiled at him sympathetically. "Five points from Gryffindor, Mr. Potter," she said, quietly.

Harry glared at her.

Ron handed Hermione a note in a few minutes, when McGonagall had finally turned on to other matters and gone to hand back homework. She opened it up, snorted, and passed it on to Harry, who had the most horrible time trying not to laugh. It said, "Not like old Snape would have any idea what sex education is about, anyway. And now he's got an excuse to take more points. This is going to bugger all."

* * *

"Lastly, Severus," said Dumbledore, "I'm afraid you're getting the short straw with the seventh years, this year." 

Severus Snape glared at the ancient Head Master, convinced that he finally had proof that the old man was insane. "Can't I just try a pink tu-tu on the Minister of Magic?" he suggested grimly. "It's safer."

The other teachers snickered appreciatively.

"I afraid not," said Dumbledore. "It simply isn't his color."

"Purple, then," Snape muttered under their open laughter. "Very well, I accept as I have no choice. Is there any further treasure you wish to bestow on me?"

"Not at the moment," he said. "Unless you'd like a sherbert lemon?"

"Absolutely not," Snape said with what, for him, was a disgusted face. It was hard to tell - he usually managed an absolute revulsion to most things. McGonagall sighed and kept her seat as the others left in the wake of Snape's stalking departure.

"The Gryffindors aren't happy about it, of course," she said after the room was clear.

"I'm sure," agreed the Head Master. "But it will do him some good to have something to think about besides the next summons."

"You do realize that you're out of your mind, don't you Albus?" she said, gently.

"If I did," he said, cheerfully, "then I couldn't be."

She left the tower room quietly, leaving a concerned sigh floating up the staircase behind her.

* * *

Harry told Ron to meet him on the Quidditch pitch after dinner, then went looking for Hermione. He found her exactly where he expected to, sitting dejectedly in the library, staring into a book about something that was probably well over his head. He hoped it was just her NEWT level Ancient Runes homework, but was suspicious enough of her present depressed behavior to believe it was most likely to be something much more complicated. "Why weren't you at dinner?" he asked. 

"I didn't feel like eating," she said, glumly.

"Yeah, me either," he agreed. "But I've got these two friends who always pester me about it."

"Maybe I could talk to those friends of yours," she offered.

"They'd probably just pester you, too," he said. "C'mon Hermione, I know something's been bothering you lately. Do you want to talk about it?"

She looked at the book for a few more moments, then up at him. "Everything's just been too much, lately Harry," she said, finally, in a quiet and miserable little voice. She reminded him of the little girl he knew to start with, more than the half-grown woman he'd become used to lately.

Harry wrapped an arm around her shoulders as she started to cry. "You need to go to McGonagall," he said. "Tell her you've taken on too much."

Hermione stared at him in horror. "Oh, no, Harry, I couldn't!" She looked at him as if he were suggesting she run naked around the school. "She'd find out, and then I'll be in so much trouble!"

Harry looked at her. "What're you talking about, Hermione?" he asked.

She blinked at him. "Nothing," she insisted. "What are you talking about?"

Harry rolled his eyes. "Look, Hermione, you need to get some rest. I'm going to walk you back to your room, ok? Then you just go to sleep and things will make a lot more sense tomorrow."

He managed to get Hermione to the end of the corridor before she started to protest. "I'm ok, Harry," she told him and pulled away. He frowned. "No, you're not, please at least come back to the Tower?"

She rolled her eyes. "I said I was ok," she insisted. "I've got another homework assignment that I have to... oh, damn."

Harry turned his head when she breathed that last whisper. "Damn," he muttered.

"Is there a problem, Miss Granger?" asked Snape, coldly.

"N-no, sir," she squeaked, her face turning a vivid crimson.

"Mr. Potter, release Miss Granger at once. Ten points from Gryffindor for snogging in the corridors."

Harry felt his face go white. He was used to - tired of, but used to - Snape's rude and angry behavior around him. They hated each other, plain and simple, and nothing was going to change that. But embarrassing Hermione like that when she didn't need it, coerced Harry into saying something he probably shouldn't have done. "She fell asleep in the library, Professor," he lied slightly. "She needs to go to bed."

Hermione glared at him.

"I've very little doubt, Potter, that Miss Granger would fall asleep in the library every night if you let her. It's hardly an extraordinary occurrence, given her proclivities toward the excessive and, if it bothers you, I suggest you exchange friends. Get back to your dormitories, both of you, before I take more points."

They hurried away, Hermione with her mouth wide open. When they'd put three flights of stairs between them and the snarky Potions Master, Harry smiled at her. "I think he was complimenting you," he said.

Hermione snorted. "I just love his back-handed appreciation. He and Ron could write a book: Everything to Say to Annoy Every Witch You Know."

Harry laughed as they clattered up the steps. "Chapter 1: Tell Her What to Do."

Hermione snickered. "Chapter 2: Argue. Often."

It was Harry's turn and he had to struggle to find something else Ron and Snape had in common. "Chapter 3: Appearance isn't Everything."

Hermione started to laugh, now. "Oh, no!" she exclaimed. "Remember that time Ron and I were going into Hogsmeade? And he wore those..."

Harry couldn't help it. He loved Ron, but he knew him. He was laughing when he dropped Hermione off, finally, at her door, and still snickering appreciatively when he arrived on the Quidditch pitch. He forgot to find out what was bothering her.

* * *

So tell me what you think! Can't wait to find out! 


	4. Chapter 4: The Table is Bare

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best".

**Chapter 4: The Table Is Bare**

Hermione watched as Harry and Ginny slipped off toward Hogsmeade, hand in hand, and saw Ron reach for Luna's hand, then hesitate. Luna was a very, very special girl. When Hermione had first met her, she'd believed Luna completely mad. In their sixth year, she'd learned they had something in common - something besides Ron. The simple truth was, Luna was a mature and sensible woman, walking around as a child at Hogwarts. At times, it hurt Hermione's pride - Luna was, after all, calmer about this situation than she felt she would have been in her place. "You want to come with us, Hermione?" he asked, pleading.

She smiled. The only person left who was REALLY having trouble dealing with Hermione's potential reaction to Ron and Luna was Ron. "Actually, I'm going down with Colin and Dennis and some of the girls from Hufflepuff. We'll be at the Three Broomsticks at 3 to meet Harry and Ginny. You two come join us, ok? And have a good time."

Luna stood on her tip toes and hugged Hermione, who had grown rather taller than Luna had done. "Good luck," the distant, dreamy girl whispered.

Hermione laughed merrily, linked arms with the Creevy brothers, and strolled, feeling quite triumphant, into Hogsmeade.

They got separated from the boys in the book store. Hermione got separated from the girls in the Magic Wardrobe, while they were looking at rather intimate apparel she bet they would never wear, and she looked for a more sensible new nightgown.

She wandered over to the Three Broomsticks and found Hagrid having a tankard at one of the corner tables. She went over to join him, and discovered he was trying to grade the essays he'd assigned to his third years. "I didn't know you gave essays, Hagrid," she said with surprise.

"I don', norm'ly, but 'as this lot ent quite as sensible as yeh all were, I thought I'd better." He looked up at her. "Don' need no more hippogriff accidents."

No, indeed, Hermione agreed, thinking back to how Malfoy had made such an amazing stink over a few scratches. She pulled out a book she'd brought with her and started to read, enjoying the companionable few moments before the crowds of students came piling in. She got through another chapter of "Muggleborn Magic", completely lost by trying to dig her way through the convoluted soap opera plot. She'd borrowed it from Ginny, intrigued by the title, but discovered upon opening it what she should have realized - there was more innuendo, suggestion, and action in the first chapter than in the entire top three years at Hogwarts.

Madam Rosemerta brought her a butterbeer, for which Hermione thanked her. She read the top essay upside down. "Don't know much about flobberworms, do they?" she asked, amused. Hagrid looked up at her with tired, worried eyes.

"No, they don'." He sighed. "Yeh can help if yeh wan'," he said - pleaded, really.

She smiled and picked up the stack he'd already graded, just to see if he had a system that was working. "Just don't let anyone catch me," she said. "Especially not the Slytherins, or you'd never hear the end of it. It'd be just like the Slytherins to have another Malfoy in third year."

"Two or three at any given time, Miss Granger," came the smooth and silky voice from somewhere to her left.

She looked up with surprise. Snape was sitting at the other end of the table with them, a dark glass in front of him, his hair in a wind blown disarray. He was reading the Daily Prophet.

"I didn't see you there, Professor," said Hermione, faintly.

"You seemed completely taken with your enthralling quest for truth and knowledge."

She fought down the urge to blush, looking at the book still in her hand. She imagined herself saying, "You say that and still read that rag?" She gestured toward the Daily Prophet with an indignant hand, but the words that came out of her mouth were, "But that... you... I mean, they LIE, sir!" She wanted to crawl under the table - why couldn't she ever stand up to him?

He smiled his icy smile and said, "I like to keep apprised of the sentiments of the less than informed. I assume that is precisely the reason you gave Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley as to why you are still taking it?"

Now, she was blushing. Cold, conceited, arrogant... He raised a meticulous eyebrow at her, and she remembered what Harry had said about Snape reading minds.

A few moments passed in silence, angry for Hermione, desperate for Hagrid. She couldn't even guess what Snape was thinking. No one ever knew what went on in that man's mind. Hermione read the first essay. "I think you actually have a system going here, Hagrid," she said, fondly.

"Yeah," Hagrid agreed. "Seemed easier that way."

"Amazing," sneered Snape, his voice so low, Hermione was sure Hagrid hadn't heard him. Hermione glared at him again, but his returned glare frightened her back to the task at hand. She hated him, oh she hated him. 'I hate...' she thought, then stopped when she realized he was smirking at her, the Slytherin look of triumph so prevalent on his face.

"Good to see yeh out today, Professor Snape," Hagrid said in his friendly, welcoming voice. "I haven't seen you in the Great Hall fer days." He chewed thoughtfully on his pencil, then drew a careful red line over a section of text and scribbled slowly in the margin.

Snape sighed loudly. "I assure you, were it not absolutely necessary that I acquire a new copy of the so-called TEXT book that will teach these bothersome little brats how to get all sweaty and degenerate without hurting themselves or anyone else, I would be ANY where but here with these ... people."

Madam Rosemerta was just approaching their table again and Hermione saw the killing look the woman threw him. He raised his glass to her in wordless toast and inclined his head respectfully. "Present company excepted, of course," he said.

Madam Rosemerta refilled Hermione's butterbeer, Hagrid's tankard, and ignored Snape. Hermione thought that she would rather be pulled into a hole then let the topic continue unchecked, so she asked Madam Rosemerta about the shiny green shoes the woman wore.

Hermione was impressed with the No-trip charm and said she thought it was prudent that this pair had also included a Stay Clean charm. After the woman had thanked her and gone away, Snape sneered softly, "And now, I suppose you must read every book on wizarding footwear that you can find, then pronounce that you are an expert cobbler?"

Hermione wanted to yell at him, shout at him, tell him to mind his own damn business and what the hell was wrong with him, that he thought there was something WRONG with actually acquiring knowledge for its own sake. What she said was, "No, sir, I'm not really interested in shoes."

"Pity," he said. She realized then that he was baiting her, trying to get her to explode, or do something stupid, for reasons that were always Snape's own. She knew he was using magic on her, watching her reactions, carefully calculating how much more it would take. Anger didn't effect him; he knew she was too afraid of his to act on it.

'Fine,' she thought. 'Let's see what Mr. Legilimency thinks of this.' Meticulously, she conjured an image behind her eyelids. Inside her head, she rose from her chair, and sashayed over to him, her steps precise, her form graceful. She reached his seat and leaned over him, insinuating herself between him and his paper. In her mind, she met his black eyes with her own dark ones, reached out with one hand that fluttered, caressingly, toward his face. She never touched him, but stroked the air along the line of his jaw with gentle fingers, watching the darkness grow smoky in his eyes. She imagined that she felt the heat from him as her hand touched the air softly, never quite contacting skin, however he moved his head.

Hermione was startled out of her reverie by the sound of a chair scraping hard against the wood floor. "Miss Granger," Snape snapped. Was she imagining it, or was his voice a little bit funny? "You are napping Miss Granger and, I expect, disturbing everyone in the room." He picked up his drink and drained it, collected his paper, and stormed away.

She looked blankly at Hagrid, who looked back at her briefly. Then he tilted his heavy head back to his essays, "Was it summat I said?"

Hermione carefully put her book on the table. What in the world had she been thinking? She had always been attracted to his mind and his bravery, could hardly remember a time since first year that she wasn't. She believed Dumbledore when he said the Potions Master was to be trusted. She couldn't find it in her to hate him, even for that one time when he insulted her so badly he made her cry. Ok, two times. Ok, often. She knew it was stupid to think that under all that darkness and fury was a good man, but she thought there must be at least a tolerable one in need of the benefit of the doubt. She had never considered him physically attractive. Never before this.


	5. Chapter 5: Robin's Egg Blue

**Hi, everyone, and sorry about the wait. What with the hectic holidays and the system outages, this one's taken a bit of time to put up. Thanks, as always, for the wonderful encouragement, and I appreciate all the nice reviews.**

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**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

Chapter 5: Robin's Egg Blue 

Hermione was sitting in the History of Magic classroom, waiting for everyone to arrive. She was taking a break from her huge pile of homework, guiltily reading Ginny's book, wondering if she would ever get to the end of it. So far, the main character – the mainest main character – had been kidnapped by Barbary pirates, trapped in a harem, traded and sold between 14 different wizards, nearly blown up by the Dark Lord Mafisto, and subject to the machinations of a Muggle physicist. All this before the age of 17. In this chapter, the already voluptuous and conniving girl had entered Hogwarts quite late and been taken by lust for her teacher.

Hermione giggled and bent over to put the book away as she heard someone behind her. Ron had promised to come meet her early, so she was expecting him. "That's it! You can take this stupid book back to your sister. I can't believe this cheeky brat. She's got her divination teacher over the desk and is…" She looked up from her bag and met Snape's eyes with horror.

"Am I to presume, Miss Granger, that you have not yet recovered from your pursuit of mindless drivel?"

She looked at her shoes. "No, sir. I normally don't read things like this."

"Then why are you now, Ms. Granger? Attempting to acquire information for a previously unknown facet of the Muggleborn lifestyle?"

"No, sir," she whispered, miserably, looking up at him. "I just…"

"What were you saying when I entered the room?" He was jeering at her, laughing behind those black eyes.

She felt her cheeks heat, then whiten. Then, all of the sudden, something snapped. She rose to her feet. "I'll show you, sir," she whispered and had her hands on his shoulders before he could think to move away. His arms went around her to stop himself from falling under the force of her sudden move. She raised her face to reach his lips, brushing them with hers, so that he could feel the friction without feeling an actual pressure, or even an actual touch. She brought her hand up to brush the side of his face, grazing the line of his jaw, tracing it with one finger, a whisper of heated air that barely breathed across his skin. He moved suddenly, whether to jerk his head away or pull her closer, she didn't know...

"Hermione!"

Hermione gasped and the world suddenly shifted. She pulled her head up and looked around at Ron, knowing what she must look like, her eyes wide open, her hair plastered to her face. She had been sleeping – dreaming – and she hadn't even known. She looked around the room, eyes wide with horror, but they seemed to be the only ones there. "Ron, you scared me to death!"

"Yeah, you sorta are as pale as the Bloody Baron." He sat down in the desk behind her. "Were you having a nightmare?" he asked, kindly. "I'm glad I interrupted if you were."

She smiled at him, her next best friend, and thought he would have chalked it up to nightmare, even if he had known what she had dreamed about. "Look, I wanted to ask you what you're doing for Harry for Christmas."

"Isn't it a bit EARLY for that, Hermione?"

"Well, maybe, but Ron, it's really important. He could really use cheering up, and I can't be with him on the holidays this year and I thought maybe we could come up with something before then. Please, Ron?"

Ron glared at her, trying to look all surly and indignant as he wanted to when his leisure was interrupted. But he finally gave in to her hopeful smile and tossed out one of his characteristic jokes. "You know what he'd probably like best? Get Snape away from Hogwarts for Christmas so they're not constantly running into each other."

Hermione laughed. "I'll have to think about it." They talked of other possibilities for several more minutes as everyone kept filing in. Hermione decided to hand the book to Luna and ask her to return it to Ginny. She knew Ron would forget, and didn't know when she'd see the only Weasley girl again. Snape arrived into the class just as she pulled it out.

His voice was like satin on sandpaper – rich and grating. "Am I to presume, Miss Granger, that you have not yet recovered from your pursuit of mindless drivel?"

Hermione couldn't do more than gape at him as he made his way to the front of the class.

Snape sat down behind the desk and called the roll, taking ten points from Harry for answering "here" instead of "here, sir," and five points from Ravenclaw because it took one of them more than two seconds to answer him. Hermione sat in her seat, watching him, frantically wondering if the line had been the same because he had actually been in her dream or because she knew him so well that her subconscious could supply words he would actually himself say. She wondered which was worse.

While Snape wrote a few words on the blackboard behind him, Ron passed her a note. It was a tiny, very accurate cartoon Snape with a speech bubble that said, "You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art that is shagging…"

Hermione fought it, hard, handing the note to Harry and breathing very carefully. When he looked at her and she looked at him, all three of them burst out laughing. Snape turned on his heel, the look on his face the same awful look she had seen him wear at the single meeting of the Dueling Club in second year. His eyes caught the paper before Harry could vanish it. "_Accio note_," he said and pointed his wand at Harry's hand.

Even with Harry's blindingly fast reflexes, Snape managed to get the paper. He glared furiously at them each in turn, suspicious of the fact that people rarely got things away from Harry if The-Boy-Who-Lived wanted to hold on to them anymore. Harry raised his eyebrows, daring Snape to open the paper. Giving in to his curiosity, the Potions Master unfolded the small slip of parchment. He read what was written there, then looked up at Ron, who was sinking slowly into his desk. "Let's see. Five points each from Gryffindor and an extra five from Mr. Weasley."

They waited until he turned away and stared at each other in surprise. Hermione watched him and would have sworn she saw him tuck the parchment into his notes.

He had them read the long, boring introduction to their textbook and take down the notes on the blackboard. Hermione, having anticipated this, had managed to refrain from reading their book prematurely. She was sure he would have them read today and make them do an essay for next Monday. The reason was obvious – the Gryffindor/Slytherin Quidditch match was coming this weekend and he would want the Gryffindors as inconvenienced as possible. And she was right. "I'll expect a three foot essay on the proper methods of casting protective charms and spells. You can turn it in on Monday to seventh year prefects who can bring them to me. And if you please, Miss Granger, stick to the topic at hand. I do not need to know everything you have ever learned from Professor Flitwick."

She glared at him and got up with the boys to leave. Why did he have to be this way? It wasn't as if it didn't matter to demonstrate that she had learned her lessons well. Mind, it was Harry who needed to know his best, but they were all doomed, anyway, to have to stand and fight with whatever magic knowledge they had available. I won't think about that, she declared.

"That was weird," Harry said as they retreated toward Gryffindor tower. "He only took twenty points. I was sure we would get a detention."

"I was sure we were dead," said Ron, going pale just thinking about it. "But you know, I think he thought it was funny."

Hermione had wondered if she was the only one who sensed that. "Probably just because it proved you actually listened to him at least once," she said.

"Noticed he didn't miss a chance to insult you, though, Hermione." Ron said grimly.

"He takes a grouchiness potion every morning," Luna said, sincerely. "He's not actually like that."

Hermione tried to ignore her. Nice little fantasy that, and it would certainly have made it easier to reconcile what was going on in her head with what was going on in her heart. "I think he just wants me to…" She stopped suddenly. Her face was wet and they were staring at her. "What?" she whispered, miserably.

"You're crying, Hermione," Harry said, tenderly. At the sound of such gentle concern from a boy whose moods normally fluctuated between fury and quidditch, she broke down entirely. Next thing she knew, Ron and Harry were both holding her up, while she felt Luna's hand on her hair. She heard a quiet voice say, "I'll get McGonagall," and couldn't even protest. Hands were all around her, arms supporting her. She could hear Ginny and Lavender on the outskirts, two second years she had befriended, the Creevy boys whispering.

"It's ok, Hermione." Harry whispered as he guided her into the common room. He sat with her on a sofa, and Ron pulled up a stool beside her, holding her hand. She felt surrounded in warmth, welcome, loved, and bitterly, miserably alone.

Professor McGonagall came into her line of vision, then bent over her, trying to stare into Hermione's flooding eyes. "Ms. Granger, whatever is the matter?" she asked. It was the one tone of voice the stern, older witch could have used to make matters even worse. Hermione sobbed again and started to wail in earnest, all the while trying to choke it down and breathe like a sane woman. "He hates me," she announced bitterly. "He hates me, and I never did anything to him."

McGonagall looked at Harry. "Bring her along, Mr. Potter," she said in a brisk voice.

Before Hermione knew what had happened, Harry had picked her up and cradled her against his chest and shoulder like a child. She hoped that Ginny didn't get mad and that thought only made her crying continue. They stepped through the portrait hole, Hermione's body still aching with the effort of trying to stop sobbing, when she heard Dumbledore's voice. She still couldn't stop crying. "I think Miss Granger will need some rest," the ancient wizard said and walked along with them, patting her hand gently every stair case or so. After awhile, Harry was huffing and puffing in her ear. Even mythical strength, she thought, had limits when attached to an ordinary boy. Ron took her from Harry as they reached the bottom of the stairs. His arms around her were familiar and would have been so comforting if she was not so miserable and so afraid of what his girlfriend would say. She felt another pat from Dumbledore. "He hates me," Hermione whispered through a hiccup. "He hates me and I've worked so hard and he doesn't care, he just hates me." She sobbed again and stuffed her hand into her mouth.

They climbed some stairs. Ron stopped and leaned up against the wall. Hermione tried again to stop her tears by closing her eyes tight shut and pretending that she was not dying of embarrassment and sorrow. Someone took her from Ron (probably Harry again, though this time he felt far more secure) and carried her somewhere and put her into a bed. Hermione opened her eyes to see Harry, Ron, and McGonagall all smiling down at her. She choked back more tears. "Anxiety attack," Madam Pomfrey muttered from one side. "I've been expecting this one for years now." There was a sound of clinking glass and a muttered exchange, then Ron was holding her head up while Madame Pomfrey poured a smoky concoction down her throat.

"Valarian," she coughed. "I'm so sorry, Harry, I don't know what's wrong. It's just so sad. We're all in so much trouble and he's not helping, and I'm not helping, and everything's so hard. I feel so stupid. And I didn't do anything, you know, except in third year. And he hates…" She felt sleep coming up to get her. There was the vague impression of Harry and Ron saying they would return for her in the morning, and of McGonagall and Dumbledore explaining that things would be fine when she woke. There was Madame Pomfrey saying to call her if she needed anything. Then, when all the voices had gone and she was almost sure she was asleep, there was one more voice, chocolate dark and just as rich. "No one hates you, Miss Granger." A warm touch on her hands, footsteps, then silence.

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I know, I know. Sounds a little trite and a little strange, perhaps a bit out of character. Trust me – it's not what it seems. Let me know what you think. 


	6. Chapter 6: Bottomless Air

**Hi and thanks for all the nice reviews – I appreciate people enjoying my work – it makes me want to work harder.**

Now, I do have one I need to explain. **duj, you're absolutely right**, her list is a little skewed, and that's actually done on purpose. There's a tendency in people to only accept guilt where they feel remorse. There's only one instance of canon remorse that I can locate in Hermione in all the books which is the PoA scene "We attacked a teacher…" We do not see everything from her point of view – it's entirely possible that Hermione has apologized for setting Snape on fire in first year – it's certainly the Gryffindor way, aside from being in character for Hermione. As for stealing the ingredients, there may be something she knows that we don't, but what we do know for sure is there is no point where Hermione feels guilt for it that we see. She's unlikely to see some instance where she doesn't feel she's done wrong as "doing something" to Snape. So that's why. Oh, and the other stuff, Snape has no one to blame but himself – you treat people like dirt, they're going to bury you.

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Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 6: Bottomless Air**

"Severus Snape," Minerva McGonagall snarled, her hands on her hips curled into fists, her eyes blazing with power and with fury. Snape had never quite gotten over the breathless awe he had felt the first moment he met this woman and now, more than three decades later, she hit him with it full force. "What did you do to Miss Granger?"

'Nothing,' he thought, in the piping little voice of the first year who had earned her wrath in his first week at Hogwarts. He shook his head, trying to get the child in his skull to stop whimpering. "Whatever problems Miss Granger is having with her own personal water works, I assure you that I have no explanation and certainly no cause to believe that I am at fault."

"'He hates me'?!" she demanded. "Who on Earth else could the poor girl be referring to?"

"Potter, Weasley? How am I to know what goes on in the addled mind of a 16 year old inattentive witch?"

"She's 17," McGonagall said, bluntly. "Technically, I suppose she's well on her way to 18, but nevermind that. She certainly wasn't fighting when Mr. Weasley and Mr. Potter carried her up to the Hospital Wing."

"She was calm enough when I carried her, too..." Snape snapped.

"She didn't know you were carrying her," McGonagall interrupted. "You know what, Severus, I think you're jealous."

He sputtered, swore, sputtered again, tried to think of something to say and tried to fight the urge to scream when McGonagall just looked at him with enormous satisfaction.

"You're jealous," she proclaimed decisively. "You know she's the cleverest witch in the whole school, and probably the cleverest we've produced here in years. She's easily your intellectual equal, she beat you in ALL your O.W.L.s AND she's in Gryffindor, instead of your own house."

He muttered, "You forgot to say Muggleborn." He rubbed a hand up the bridge of his nose. "I've no idea where you got these preposterous accusations, Minerva, but I assure you Miss Granger and her academic prowess mean absolutely nothing to me."

"Well, they should," McGonagall snapped.

Snape frowned. She'd trapped him neatly. "Believe what you like. I have to report to Dumbledore."

"Tell Albus that I said if you frighten Miss Granger again, even she won't be clever enough to find the bits of you."

"I didn't do anything!" he shouted after her. What was it with witches that they always had to have the last word?

"Did too!" came echoing up the stairs at him.

"Do come in, Severus, have a seat." Dumbledore murmured when he arrived at the Headmaster's office. "Tea? Brandy?"

Snape sighed. He wanted the brandy, but hadn't lifted anything alcoholic to his lips since the night before the horrific events of the Triwizard Cup Final in Potter's fourth year. There was too much at stake, too much risk that one glass too many would soften his brain just so and render his tongue from clever to wagging. "Tea, please, Headmaster."

Dumbledore waved his wand and conjured tea and tea service. Snape had always found Albus's personal blend to be quite tasty, if a little imaginary. While Dumbledore poured out, Snape looked up at the portrait of Phineas Nigellus, who looked back at him with a calculating smile. Nigellus was the last Slytherin Headmaster of Hogwarts, and the portrait fully expected Snape to be the next. Snape, personally, expected to be dead before there was another Headmaster at all, since he had long decided that the Dark Lord would get Dumbledore only over Snape's dead body.

"Did you have a chance to check on Miss Granger?" Dumbledore asked kindly.

"Madam Pomfrey said she left the Hospital Wing with Ginny Weasley this morning in reasonably good spirits and that, apparently all the girl really needed was a good night's sleep." He looked at Dumbledore's kind smile for fully five seconds before he realized that he'd been tricked. He glared at the nosy old codger, but all Dumbledore did was nod kindly.

"As you may have noticed, since you were in the Hospital Wing today, there are fifteen students from Gryffindor and Slytherin houses in various states of hex and jinx recovery."

"I had noticed," Snape agreed. He'd used it as his cover to Madam Pomfrey, actually. It would NEVER do for anyone else to know that he'd been checking up on the Head Girl.

"Seventeen," Dumbledore corrected as a paper airplane with Madam Pomfrey's writing on it sailed to his desk and unfolded itself. "It seems there is a bit more animosity between the Houses this year, probably a result of the upcoming Quidditch match."

"Potter, again," Snape complained. "Just yesterday, Mr. Malfoy told me that he had caught Potter and Weasley whispering something about hexing the Slytherin beaters into oblivion."

"Possibly this was due to the fact that the Slytherin beaters in question had stolen Mr. Weasley's broom?" Dumbledore asked. "Professor McGonagall managed to sort everything out, Severus, the game will continue."

Snape smiled as much as he could manage. He should have known Malfoy was in the middle of a mess and just telling the one small part of the story that suited the boy's convenience. Imagining the various ways in which he would make Lucius Malfoy's evil child suffer for this, he found himself missing what Dumbledore said next. "I beg your pardon, Headmaster?"

"I'd like you and Professor McGonagall to serve as crowd control during tomorrow's match. You can both ride broomsticks and watch the crowd. This is a much better way to prevent any dangerous fights than hoping someone will notice them in time."

Snape rolled his eyes. "I'd love to be here when you tell Minerva," he said with a bitter sigh.

"Tell me what?" McGonagall said as she entered the room, bringing a vial with something party-colored and strange with her. "I didn't realize you'd still be here, Severus. Good." She set the vial on Dumbledore's desk, tapped it three times with her wand and it started repeating Snape's voice very quietly and concisely from one of his Potions lectures. "The latest from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. Voice recorders."

"Have you considered that those boys make better spies than pranksters, Headmaster?" Snape asked with a sigh.

She tapped the vial again, so it began speaking only select words. "I.Sever.us.Snape.have.a.pain.in.my.bum."

"Or not," he said, grimly. Why did everyone find annoying him to be so particularly amusing? "Excuse me, Minerva," he said. "I've a class to prepare for. Why don't you tell her the good news?"

As he reached the bottom of the stairs, he heard McGonagall's voice, serious and furious. "I will get you for this, Albus Dumbledore," and Dumbledore chuckling.

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Potter dived out of the sun, barely missing McGonagall by inches, pelting madly after the golden snitch. Snape watched with great interest as Draco Malfoy looped the Gryffindor seeker and they both lost the snitch. He certainly couldn't find it, though he did find two sixth year Slytherins using a knotting charm on the hair of two second year Gryffindors. He hovered over them. "Ten points from Slytherin and don't let me catch you again." The emphasis was on the "catch" part, of course, as these were Slytherins. 

Draco dropped spectacularly through a formation of the Gryffindor chasers, barely dodging a bludger hit at him by his own stupid beater. The Slytherin seeker pulled up from his dive several feet above the ground, when he realized Potter wasn't following. Potter circled closer to the Slytherin goal-post, looking intently around him for the walnut-sized ball that had avoided them for two hours now. The score was even and incredibly low for such a long game, but then both teams were experienced and both Weasley and Malfoy trained them incessantly. A cheer went up from the Gryffindors in the crowd - Ron Weasley had blocked another shot.

Ginny Weasley had the Quaffle now and charged into the middle of a melee. Snape pulled his eyes back to the crowd and docked Gryffindor twenty points for the sticking charm a fourth year had just tried on a Slytherin fifth year. Thankfully, it hadn't worked. "At least try to perform it correctly, please Miss Johnson," he said and flew to another section of the stands.

Hermione Granger was here with Miss Lovegood of Ravenclaw and other young women of her own House. She was half out of her seat and half in it, her hands in her mouth, her hair a total wild shambles. He noticed a Slytherin prefect just behind her with a wand-tip ablaze. "Five points from Gryffindor, Miss Granger," he called down. "Your hair is causing complications." She turned her head up, hair pulled into her hands, and glared at him.

Behind his eyes was the sudden image of himself, stepping off of his broom, into the stands next to her. She met his eyes with an intense expression, not of hatred, but of passion and desire. Her hand reached up and almost touched his hair.

Snape found himself involuntarily pulling his head away from her, though she was physically no where near him. He floated up into the higher circle above the game where Draco and Potter manuevered and attempted to avoid each other. They both spotted the snitch, suddenly, and plummetted as though their brooms had evaporated. Curious, Snape followed them. Then, Draco did something that was definately a foul and definitely not caught by the referee. He reached out and kicked his opponent hard in the leg. Completely focused on the snitch, Potter lost his balance and fell.

Surprised, Snape turned his broom deeper into the dive and tried to reach Potter's flailing hand. He felt something slip.

The Gryffindors won the game - Potter caught the snitch on his way down, even as he tumbled down a curtain of heavy cloud he conjured beneath himself. Severus Snape did not find this out until much later, however. While Potter landed neatly on the ground, with only a broken leg for his trouble, Snape tumbled to one side of him through the seemingly bottomless air and managed to notice only the ground coming up very quickly to make his acquaintance.


	7. Chapter 7: 'Til Roses

_**duj, you can be in my lifeboat any time!** :-)You're right about that swearing thing, and especially given the way I'd described his reactions at that moment. I'll change it as soon as I figure out how. As to Hermione, I can picture the little first year Hermione running up to him at breakfast the last day in front of everyone: "I'm sorry I thought it was you and set you on fire ok bye…" and then running away. It may not have happened, doesn't matter. Bravery is, I guess what I'm saying, the Gryffindor way, but it's at least TEMPERED by common sense. When they DO feel guilty and DO own up to it, they apologize (R/H issue in GoF). I just don't think she feels guilty right now. She may yet, I haven't decided. I'm still pretty sure that she stacks herself as innocent of anything but the _expelliarmus_ – just like she wouldn't apologize to Malfoy for polyjuicing his two best friends and invading his common room to spy on him. Just speculating. I liked your story. Hope you're continuing it! _

_Everyone else, thanks a million for the reviews. Sorry, SamanthaRiddle, I'm afraid this one may take a while for that to happen – there's an alarmingly graphic scene coming up, though, so stay tuned…_

_BTW: I will be a few days updating again._

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 7: 'Til Roses…**

Hermione and Ron lounged on either side of Harry's bed, comfortably watching as Harry complained vigorously to Madame Pomfrey. "I'm fine, I had a broken leg, you fixed it, can't I go?"

"No, Mr. Potter, I think you would be safest to stay here. I have charmed the bone, certainly, but it is quite fragile. I can't expect you to be careful without supervision."

Harry glared at her as she bustled about the bedside. "How's Professor Snape?" he asked, grudgingly.

"Comfortable," she assured him. "Miss Granger managed to conjure something reasonably soft for the Professor to land on."

Harry nodded. He hadn't noticed it, but then he'd been blacking out with pain from Malfoy's stupid stunt. He smiled up at Hermione and found she was hiding in her textbook, her face subtly pinker where he could see it. Madam Pomfrey walked away, muttering to herself that it was obviously a male thing. He fiddled with his blankets. "Was it something good?" he asked.

"You know, Hermione, you should've done a bathtub," Ron said softly.

Hermione snickered. "Look, he's lucky it wasn't a tub of pudding, but I was afraid he'd drown. That was the first thing I thought of – he ended up landing on the second thing."

"Everyone's gonna be staring at you, you know that, right?" Ron said.

"What'd she conjure?" Harry asked, his eyes wide.

Hermione buried her face in her hands while Ron let out one loud guffaw, then covered his mouth before Madam Pomfrey returned to throw him out. After he'd calmed down a little bit, he looked up and grinned at Harry. "Nothing much, Harry, just a bed."

Harry smiled, hearing a bit of Ron's twin prankster brothers in his voice. "Just a bed?" he asked.

"Big enough to be sure he'd land on it," Hermione whispered.

"Great humongous bloody thing, Harry," Ron chortled. "With red sheets."

Hermione groaned and Harry reached out to rub her back. "That's not too bad – just say it was Gryffindor colors."

"They were that shiny stuff - satin, Ginny told us," Ron said. "And…"

"Oh, God…" Hermione moaned.

"And covered in real rose petals," Ron finished triumphantly, grinning at them both.

Harry gaped at him. "No," he said, finally.

Hermione nodded miserably. "Just like in one of those bad Muggle romance movies, Harry. They picked him up and he had petals all over him."

"I thought McGonagall would break a rib," Ron said. "You know, trying not to laugh."

"I figure Snape's gonna break my neck," Hermione said sadly.

"You'll be fine," Harry promised. "Even a great snarky git like him can't possibly be too mad at someone who saved his life."

"Snape, Harry," Ron reminded him. "You're mistaking him for someone who DOESN'T scare dementors into going back to whatever they were doing."

Harry smiled. "It'll be ok," he assured them. He looked over at Hermione, watching her do her homework for several minutes before he turned his attention back to Ron. "You fall off the broom next time, mate. I've had enough of it."

Ron laughed. "Sorry, mate, but the rest of the games aren't like this one. I fall off a broom against Hufflepuff and it'll be my own stupid fault."

Harry smiled at him, then sobered painfully. Ron was right. Two more games and they would probably never play regulation Quidditch together again. He felt his throat get a little tight.

Hermione looked up at him incredulously, then jumped off the bed, leaving her books lying there as she walked away. Harry had a sneaking suspicion where she was headed and shook his head. Absolutely, he would NOT bring that up to Ron. The youngest Weasley boy would blame himself. So he turned the subject back to Quidditch and they went over the game play by play.

Hermione returned by the time they were up to Malfoy's little foul - and how Madam Hooch never stood a chance to catch that. Ron was all for telling her and hoping she'd pull Malfoy off the team.

"Never happen," Harry said. "Besides, they might get a good seeker if she took him off." He turned to Hermione and frowned at the distracted little smile on her pretty face. Something about this really bothered him, but he couldn't put his finger on anything worse than the fact that Snape was a slimy greaseball who couldn't be trusted. "How's the professor?" he asked her.

She was halfway through explaining that Snape was really quite pleasant at the moment before she realized that he had trapped her into admitting something she didn't want to. "So he's - what? - unconscious? What?"

She glared at him fiercely. Harry grinned in great paternal humor. "Come on, Hermione," Ron said. "If he's trashed, I'd love to know."

"Yes," she admitted. "Madam Pomfrey's got him on some kind of pain killer and it seems to have gone to his head."

"Cool," Harry said and, without permission, climbed out of his bed. "C'mon," he suggested to Ron.

Ron stared at him. "No way," Ron gasped in awe.

Harry shrugged. "Suit yourself, mate," he said and walked quickly and quietly across the near empty ward. His leg still felt a little tingly, almost as though it had been asleep. The stone floor was frigid under his bare feet. He walked behind the curtain where Madam Pomfrey had stowed the groaning and complaining Potions Master some hours ago. "Oy, Professor," he said as quietly as possible.

"Am I to be plagued by Gryffindors, then? What can I do for you, Potter?" The sinister man astonished Harry by giggling. "Did you know that there are fifty seven tiles directly visible from this bed, Potter? Of course you did. When you leave Hogwarts, we'll have the Headmaster put a plaque above your bed: 'Harry Potter slept here. Often.'"

Harry smiled. "I only counted 53, but I think it's 'cause I'm shorter than you."

Snape snickered. "_Sic Parvulus Gloria Mundi_."

Harry grinned, and rolled his eyes. "Hardly, Professor." He looked at Snape who was muttering something about butterflies and the grin faded. "Thanks for trying," he whispered sincerely.

"Can you imagine the trouble Draco would have been in?" Snape frowned and looked blearily up at Harry. "Not anything to do with you, Potter." He coughed and ran a hand through his hair. "Need to wash that," he muttered. Harry bit his lip hard to keep from grinning any more than he already was. "Snarky, something snarky, make the Potter boy, silly thing, go away." Harry KNEW he thought he was talking to himself. "Tell Miss Granger that mortification is rarely fatal, although in her case, I might be willing to help it along." He closed his eyes and seemed to fall asleep, humming an old muggle song as he drifted off.

Harry gaped at him, shook his head, and walked away. When he got back to bed, he found Hermione grinning at him. "That was weird," Harry said.

"What was he humming?"

Harry sighed. "I dunno. Sounded like 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.'"

Ron stared at him in disbelief, then busted out laughing.

When Madame Pomfrey finally released Harry, it was dinner time and they went down to the Great Hall. Hermione tried to eat slowly, but watching Ron and Harry go through the match for the third time, she realized they weren't going to notice if she did disappear. People were whispering behind her, and she didn't want to be here at the moment. Ginny Weasley came over and flopped down next to Harry. Neville and Seamus, the Gryffindor beaters, appeared at either side of Ron. When the other chasers turned up moments later, Hermione grinned and excused herself. Ginny watched her curiously for a brief moment but then Harry asked her a question and she turned her total attention onto him.

She slipped back into the Hospital Wing but found Professor Snape standing up and getting ready to leave. She heard herself squeak some indescisive syllable before she could stop herself. "Good to see you up, Professor," she said faintly.

He glared at her. "Why are you here, Miss Granger?" he sneered.

She kept walking past him and didn't turn around. "I've lost a book," she lied, quietly. "I was trying to see if I left it by Harry's bed." She could feel him glowering at her. Deep breath, Hermione, he'll never know if you don't say anything else. She walked back toward the bed and chuffed in disgust. "No, it's not here, either," she muttered and turned to go back out.

Snape sighed. "You'd best ask Madame Pomfrey, Granger. She may have already found it and moved it."

"Oh, yes, very good idea. Thank you, sir." She turned toward Pomfrey's office door.

"Incidentally, what book was it?"

She turned red and didn't look at him. "My... um... the um... I was doing my... that is, well, but you assigned an essay and I thought I could do that while I waited for Harry."

"Idiot child," she heard him mutter. "If you do not locate your copy, Miss Granger, I will allow you to borrow mine. Come to my office and I will lend it to you. Your essay is due Monday, after all."

Since he couldn't see her, Hermione grinned. Sometimes it was hard to tell what Snape would do next, but helping a student was usually NOT on the list, unless it was a Slytherin. She stuck her head in the door and asked Madame Pomfrey who, of course, hadn't seen the book. She was wondering what had got into Snape when she felt someone right behind her.

He was staring down at the top of her head. "Are you coming, Miss Granger, or would you rather attempt to borrow a copy from one of your classmates? Since doubtlessly they will be doing their essays on Monday at breakfast, I think you would have time."

Hermione sighed and fell into step beside him. He loped with his usual fury, unconscious of his grace, toward his office. Hermione had a sudden, vivid image of dancing with him, seeing that grace utilized to the best of its potential. Snape shook his head as he started down the dungeon staircase, Hermione scurrying to keep up.

When Snape handed her his copy of the book, Hermione tried for a grateful, beaming smile. "Thank..."

"I only do this because I do not wish you to fail this class," he said. "We do not need any more evil little Potters running around."

Hermione fought that one the only way she could. "Umph. Thought you said you didn't believe the Daily Prophet?" Her eyes widened at the way his eyes turned from pitch black and cold to pitch black and furious. She turned and, before he could take points or jinx her, made a run for it.


	8. Chapter 8: Lavender's Red

_Sorry it's taken so long to update – stupid computer troubles like you WOULDN'T believe. I'll try to update about once a week now – we're about halfway through, and if I can update more often, I promise I will._

_I really appreciate all the great reviews – you folks are terrific._

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 8: Lavender's Red**

Snape handed an essay to Dumbledore on his way out of Monday's professors' meeting. "I absolutely refuse to deal with this," he said in the most menacing voice he could manage.

Dumbledore looked the paper over and for a split second the twinkle went out of his eyes. "I cannot believe this has never been handled before," he said with evident surprise and passed the paper to McGonagall.

The Gryffindor Head of House turned white and her face grew completely perturbed. "I should have realized, that wretched Muggle," she said sadly. "He's done such a... bewildered job of covering it up, hasn't he, Albus?"

The old wizard twinkled at them both. He smiled in that gentle, concerned, TERRIFYING way of his, the one that left more people cowering in corners than Voldemort at his most menacing. They were quite used to it by now, and only shrunk a little bit. They waited.

"You'll simply have to explain it, Severus," said Dumbledore decisively.

"I'd sooner take poison," Snape offered, and opened his cloak to allow Dumbledore to select from the twenty different varieties he carried with him at any given moment.

"Oh, he can't do it," Minerva snapped. "The experience would traumatize them both."

"I think it should be the responsibility of his Head of House," Snape said silkily.

"It's hardly my place to hold that sort of conversation with a boy," said Minerva in her most rational, haughty tones. "And certainly Hagrid would be unsuitable."

Snape smiled as though he had swallowed a lemon. McGonagall knew he was trying not to say something - probably something rude about Hagrid's background.

"Arthur Weasley?" she suggested.

"On assignment," Dumbledore replied.

This time Snape obviously couldn't help it. "Though he's obviously infinitely qualified to explain the topic," he muttered. She tried not to choke. They went through the names of various male Order members before deciding that they were all either unsuited for the importance of the topic or unavailable.

Snape's pitch black eyes suddenly lit with the insane mirror of the twinkle in Dumbledore's. He looked at McGonagall and she realized what he was thinking in a heart beat. "Why don't you tell him, Albus?" she asked, certain her eyes were now twinkling, too.

Even much later when they talked it over, Severus Snape and Minerva McGonagall were never quite certain how he had gotten out of that one. All they remembered was coming to the conclusion that a book might be necessary and that Ronald Weasley would be the best person to find out if that was the case. Sometimes Dumbledore just had that effect on people.

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Ron Weasley had a nightmare mission assigned to him on Tuesday afternoon. He stared at McGonagall blankly and, after trying and failing to think of a suitably flippant reply, he realized that she was serious. "You're kidding?"

"Quite frankly, Mr. Weasley, I'd rather have joked about your Quidditch team, they're certainly funnier. Simply put, there's no one else who can do this, and the question really should have been dealt with sooner. Clearly, by Thursday, a correction will need to be made."

Ron sighed. "I'll just let you know, ok?" he said and, as she nodded curtly, he walked out of the Transfiguration classroom to find Hermione waiting for him. "What was that about?" she asked.

Ron blushed. "Nothing," he said and looked around. "Where's Harry?"

"In the Library," Hermione said, obviously well aware of how extraordinary that pronouncement was.

"What for?" Ron demanded.

Hermione looked a little confused as she said, "He said he had to study for a class on Thursday." She was shifting her bag from hand to hand, looked up at Ron with her expression more worried than usual and said, "I think he's upset about something."

Ron sighed, "I think I know what it is, too," he said and stuck his head back in the door of the Transfiguration classroom. A beautiful blotch tabby was sitting on McGonagall's desk, basking in the sunlight. Ron remembered Hermione telling them that the more an animagus turned into animal form, the more they wanted to do it. "I think you were right, Professor," he said to the cat.

The cat nodded and tilted her head toward a book. Ron walked up to the desk and picked it up, a little blue covered book with random silver designs on the cover. Ron smiled at her and, remembering the cat was his teacher, refrained from patting her on the head.

"What was that about?" Hermione demanded, one hand on her hip, the other full of book bag.

"We gotta give Harry this little book, and that should cure him of his sudden affection for the library."

Hermione opened it, and Ron held his breath. She looked up at him, then, with a broad grin on her face and tears in her eyes. "Oh, that's so sad," she said, and snickered. "I never even thought about it."

Ron slowly started to grin, carefully, hoping that the half-laughing, half-crying Hermione wouldn't suddenly decide on crying and yell at him for being insensitive. "Well, I was afraid she'd make me explain it all."

"Oh, I think McGonagall's got more sense than that," Hermione said. "Ok, so we'll go find him in the library."

"Yeah, and you give him the book."

"No," she snapped, "McGonagall told you to do it, so you do it."

"Hermione, PLEASE," he begged. "You know how he gets when he's mad, and this is really gonna make him mad."

"Not if we pretend like we don't even know what's in the book," she said, smugly.

Ron looked at her carefully. "Oh, yeah, that's sneaky enough for Snape," he said. "You tell him you don't know what it is but McGonagall sent it, and I'll give him the book, and then we run away."

Hermione laughed. "Yes, and then we run away." She reached up and hugged him.

"Five points from Gryffindor, Mr. Weasley," said Snape's foul and evil voice from the end of the corridor. "No snogging in the corridors. It's your second offense, Miss Granger - ten points."

"I hate him," Hermione muttered as they turned away.

"Miss Granger, detention, tonight, six o'clock."

Ron watched, surprised, as Hermione went blank, her eyes going distant and almost as dreamy as his girlfriend's. Weird, he thought. He turned to see what Snape was doing and found the Potions master glaring at her intently. Ron didn't know what to make of it, but didn't like what he was seeing at all. He shook her shoulder and, as soon as her eyes cleared a little, dragged her down the hall. "What was that all about?" he demanded as soon as they were in the secret passageway and well away from Snape's prying eyes.

"What?" she asked, sounding quite shaky.

"Snape gave you a detention and you zonked out," Ron said. "What's the matter with you?"

"He gave me a detention and I've got so much homework, I was just trying to keep from yelling at him." She ran a quivering hand through her bushy hair and smiled up at him. Ron knew her habits now well enough to realize that there wasn't something quite true about it - she had probably been going to cry again.

"C'mon," Ron said. "We'll get this book to the library and then get dinner so you can make your detention on time. Greasy bat."

They walked into the library and found Harry slumped over a book, avoiding Ginny who was sitting across from him trying to catch his eye and ask him what was wrong. Ron had a brief insane set of visions of what she would say if she found out. None of them were particularly images he wanted in his head.

"McGonagallsentyouabook," Ron said, as fast as he could. He prepared to make a run for it, but Harry caught him with his eyes, looking frantic and embarrassed and really, really angry. "She said it's a book about stuff," Ron added, more slowly this time.

"Stuff?" Harry asked, his face turning red and then pale.

"Yes," said Hermione in her most pleading and gentle tones. "Something about muggleborns not having the information," she said and pulled an identical book out of her own bag. "She said I needed one for something, too," she added as she put the book away.

"We don't know what's in yours," Ron added, "but I hope it helps you study."

Harry narrowed his eyes at them and studied them carefully. They smiled innocently and reassuringly back at him. Nothing embarrassing, Ron thought, nothing that a best mate wouldn't do for a best mate, go on, quit being all scared and just say thanks so we can run away.

"Thanks," Harry muttered and put the little book under the other book.

Ron turned toward the door. "C'mon, Ginny," said Ron, "come down to dinner with us so we can talk about the thing with the thing and the, er..."

"Stuff," said Hermione brightly, catching Ginny's arm. Harry didn't even look up.

"Where'd you get the book, Hermione?" Ron asked her.

"Glamour on my Transfiguration book," she said. "I thought it might make him argue less." She shook her head and sighed.

Ron laughed, not because it was funny, but because of how embarrassing it was to everyone.

"What was in that book?" Ginny whispered, even though they were down in the entry hall before she asked.

Ron sighed. "Something you and mum talked about last summer and Dad and me talked about a few years ago," he said.

"Nobody bothered to tell Harry," Hermione said, in a sad and angry voice.

Ginny grinned broadly. "I would have," she said cheekily.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Tell, not show. Tell."

"Urgh," said Ron. He could hardly believe this had happened. They taught him everything about Defense Against the Dark Arts, showed him things no one his age should have to know. The Boy-Who-Lived and would have been a perfect spy had always had ways of finding out things that no one ever wanted him to know. But no one had thought about something that everyone expected him to know and no one planned to tell him. If it hadn't been for his terrible circumstances, he probably would have picked it up by now, but no one really talked about simple things like that in front of him. The boys used to joke about things like this, but only in the ignorant terms of half-knowledgeable little boys who really didn't have anything to base their theories on – used to. Now, they only talked about the war, and Voldemort, and the Death Eaters. And so, at 17, Harry Potter was upstairs in the library learning where babies came from.

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Let me know what you think and I'll try to update as fast as I can._


	9. Chapter 9: The Furrow

This chapter is dedicated to my sister – who hates this story and the ship it rode in on.

Which is why she demands to know what happens next.

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**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 9: The Furrow**

Hermione grumbled and stumbled her way into detention, having had to literally fight Draco Malfoy to get there. "I'm sorry I'm late, sir," she muttered. "I had to hex your favorite brat into lusting other rodents." She sighed. "I'm sorry I'm late, sir, Malfoy wanted to get detention with me." That wouldn't work either.

"I'm sorry, sir," she said as she walked in.

"Ten points from Gryffindor, Miss Granger. Why are you late?"

She frowned at him. "I encountered a fellow student who deliberately delayed me, sir." Let him get out of that.

"Surely as Head Girl you should possess the skills and ability to control your fellow students without undue tardiness on your part. Are your duties perhaps too ornerous for you?" She felt her breath rush out of her lungs. The false sympathy was just oozing off of him. It was moments like this that Hermione found Harry's hatred of the man to be completely reasonable.

Sometimes she wondered if she and Ron had been paticularly vile to him in a past life or something. At least his hatred of Harry was explicable - unreasonable, but explicable. While she was the first to admit that she hadn't exactly been 100 perfect to Snape, she would openly defy him to find someone who was more forthright or vocal in his support than herself - even his Slytherins. "What is my assignment, sir?" she asked as politely as she could manage.

"You failed to answer my previous question, Miss Granger."

She met his cold, black, mocking gaze with carefully detached reason. Harry had warned her that the safest way to deal with Snape at close quarters was to keep neutral and concentrate on having a clear and blank mind. "Draco Malfoy is not, in his opinion, just any other student, sir. He finds it objectionable to take orders from me."

The hook-nosed man stared at her for what seemed like ages. She fought to conflicting urges in her head, one to break eye contact and run away, one to reach out and touch him. "His objections are not something he is to inconvenience you regarding. I shall inform him."

Taken completely aback, she suddenly wondered what McGonagall had threatened him with after her sobbing fit. This was twice he'd made attempts to be halfway decent to her. He was not being nice by any stretch of the imagination, merely considerate of her looming sensitivity, but for him, it was bordering on outright sweetness.

"That station has been set up for your detention," he said. "You will need to prepare a pain relief potion to be used in the Hospital Wing. Since it is likely to be your friend Mister Potter who ends up using the potion, I expect you'll want to be extra careful."

"I'm always careful," she muttered as she made her way to the back of the room.

"Five points from Gryffindor, Miss Granger. Of course you are, there's no need to brag."

I hate him, she thought. She carefully read the instructions on the potion, though she could have prepared this one in her sleep last year. Snape was hardly stupid; he wouldn't have Neville or even Ron concoct a professional use potion, but this one was easy enough that she could handle it just fine. She tried to keep her mind from thinking of the most complicated potion she had ever brewed - no good could possibly come from him picking that out of her mind. She concentrated on how much she hated Snape and it blended gleefully with an old muggle nursery rhyme she knew. 'I will hate him on the train, I will hate him in the rain, I will hate him in a box, I will hate him with a fox, I will hate him here or there, I will hate him anywhere.' She paused and carefully added the first ingredient to the potion, stirring slowly and following the fiddly stirring directions, then lightly tossed in the second. She started carefully sectioning mugwort tips and tried to continue her poem in her head. Snape and hate would work together, but there should have been a better exact rhyme than ape or grape. Oh, well she could come back to that.

As she stirred and paused and added and diced and stirred some more, she continued adding little bits to her places she would hate Snape. 'I would hate him in Japan, I would hate him in Iran; I would hate him at the zoo, I would hate him with the flu...' By the time she got bored with it, she was trying to find a proper rhyme for 'Weasley' and had ended up at the part in her potion where she just had to watch it for half an hour. She set the little potion timer Harry had bought her for Christmas and waited.

Hermione was better than either of her male best friends at waiting, but her mind was not. It had to have constant feeding or it would turn on her. The boys used to wonder why she studied all the time but they had that answer earlier in the year when she had been unable to read for a week because of some weird lessons in History of Magic. By day two, she was bothering them constantly with worst-case scenarios that her mind presented for her amusement and by day four Ron was toying with variations of the silencing charm.

With nothing but fretting over a potion and a mad poem about hating the potions master to occupy her, the largest part of her intellect turned to trying to sort out her recent problems. The first thing that surfaced was a question about the way she'd been thinking about Snape lately.

It wasn't that she didn't want to be attracted to him. She didn't hate him like she was sure she should. But there was that in her that KNEW without a doubt that there was very little to him that SHOULD be attractive.

Her eyes trailed to the front of the room, moving slowly toward confirming the hypothesis. He was sitting at his desk still, sure, but apparently work for the Order of the Phoenix had gotten to him at last, because he was sitting in his chair, sound asleep.

He looked sort of nice like that. The lines that normally framed his face and his mouth in strict aggression were softened and, without the pitch black eyes glaring out at the world, the impression of an infuriated bird-of-prey faded. A lanky lock of his raven black hair fell across his eyes. She rather thought it wasn't so much greasy as way too fine to tolerate even regular daily abuse, though that might be wishful thinking and who was she to complain about someone else's hair, anyway? She smiled tenderly and her eyes fell to his lips. They amazed her - full and sensual and pale, they almost always drew her eyes, whether he offered a crackling vituperation or simply watched in mocking silence. They conveyed so much emotion, even as the rest of his face sat frozen in cynical unconcern.

She closed her eyes again and, unbidden, the images that had plagued her imagination of late came to the forefront. In her mind's eye, she approached him, putting her hand on his shoulder to get his attention. He closed his own large, callused hand over hers, engulfing it completely, and pulling her, breathless and startled, into his embrace. With her free hand, she reached up to feather his face, first tucking that unruly strand of hair behind his ear, then brushing past his cheek. He tilted his head into her palm, never quite completing the contact. With his other hand, he raised her hand to his chest and pressed both tightly against him, then released her hand to cup her shoulder and caress tiny circles along the line of her collarbone. Again, their skin never quite met, but she could feel the roughness of his care-worn fingers as they brushed a line of excited torture along her body. She traced the line of his chest with one hand, toying idly with his buttons, while her other hand turned, finally, to trace a single finger across the promising fullness of his lips. Her body ached, her mind cried desperation - she wanted him, oh she wanted him.

She heard a low moan that was so soft and so desperate that she didn't even know if it was his or hers. She leaned closer - he tilted his head down toward her.

When the potion alarm went off, she was shocked in one part and completely unsurprised in another. Fate was definately conspiring against her kissing Severus Snape, even in a dream, and she couldn't really blame it.

She snapped her head up and turned her complete attention onto her cauldron.

It took another twenty minutes to bottle the potion and label it, and then ten more after that to get it cleaned up. All this time she kept her eyes tilted to her work and never once tried to turn her head toward Snape, for fear of what she might see. Hermione Granger might be a Gryffindor but she wasn't that brave.

When she finally had no choice, she was actually quite relieved to see him still sleeping comfortably in his chair, his head now on his chest, his body somewhat more relaxed, a soft almost-snore coming from him. She sat watching him, wishing he would wake up for another few minutes - for as long as she could stand it before her mind wandered off and again and, in exasperation, pulled out her quill and parchment and left him a note.

As she left the room, she realized that the silly old bat would probably give her another detention for leaving this one early. She decided that if he did, she would go to Dumbledore. There was no way he was going to get away with it. And if he did it in public, she would make it worse, because he really didn't want anyone to know he was human.

When she got back to Gryffindor Tower, she only stopped for a second to check on Harry and Ron, who were comparing notes on their homework. A few seconds review revealed that they had done it right by themselves, so she smiled and explained that she was simply too exhausted from being bullied by Snape to stay up. They smiled and offered to help her get him back and she shook her head and went to bed.

On the way up, she wondered just what lengths she'd have to go to, if she wanted toget him in the first place.

In his office, Severus Snape slipped deeper into his dreams and, while the part of him that was merely a man appreciated them on a purely physical level, the part of him that was all intellect wondered and boggled at them, desperate to understand them.

There was something illicit to him, something appalling, something tantalizingly irresistable about the whole situation, imaginary though it was. Here he was, literally old enough to be her father, angry at the world, his heart a wasteland of black despair and obstacles. And there was she, the gentle one of the Gryffindor Triumvirate, that group of mad half-children he had sworn to one master to protect and to another to destroy. He wondered if there wasn't something deeply symbolic, in these dreams - something he should be analysing properly - if he could ever get his mind away from the imagined feel of her hips swaying softly against his. He couldn't seem to shake the dreams beyond a hover, a caress, that touched the air, but not the body, and left him with wonder and confusion. He had resigned himself to one fact - that he wanted Hermione Granger. He wondered if that was enough.

He was desperately afraid he was bailing a swamp as the tiny trickle of emotion connected to them began to pick up its pace, infinitesimally but incontrovertably.

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Ok, you've been waiting for this. Was it worth it? Heck, is it any good at all? Should I just quit trying to cudgel my brains and post the last two chapters (skipping what I believe to be six or eight in the middle). Review! 


	10. Chapter 10: Glass Bottom Boat

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

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Chapter 10: Glass Bottom Boat **

Snape looked up from his notes as the second class filed in and felt his jaw tighten and his teeth clench of their own accord. He counted runny little brat noses without really taking in their faces, though his eyes did stop, again without his permission, to gaze ever so briefly at the Head Girl's bushy hair.

He wanted more than anything to give her another detention. He felt he could justify it - she had walked out of the last one, after all. But he didn't trust his own motives and there was no way he was willing to risk that without being one hundred percent certain that his decisions would stand up to the scrutiny of both McGonagall and Dumbledore.

He opened his lesson plan book as the class fell silent. For a few minutes, he was determined to stand up and tell them some useful information. A momentary lapse of reason, however, hit him when he met Hermione's eyes by accident across the room, and he was assailed by the delicious idea of an elegant and sleek head girl taking him by the hand and leading him away some place more pleasant.

"Right," he said, shaking his head, desperately coping with the images in his mind by talking right off the top of his head. "You don't want to be here and neither do I. None of us has a vast quantity of time to waste, as you are meant to be studying for your NEWTs this year and I am meant to be properly teaching you to prepare for them. The day this subject turns up on a NEWT is the day we move the school to Diagon Alley." He paced back and forth in front of the class for a minute that felt like ages. "Therefore, your fellow classmates will be joining you henceforth as I do not wish to go through this more than once at a time. I will at each class assign a chapter. You will, for the next class, review it and all relevant reading. This does not mean, Miss Granger, that you have to read 'Origin of the Magic Species,' though I've no doubt you have already done so. Seven times."

He shook his head as the image of Hermione rising angrily from her chair and drawing him into an embarrassing position rose behind his eyelids. When it cleared, he continued, this time stopping to take a piece of parchment that Thomas was trying to hand to Brown on the far side of the room. "Your eyes are like pools in the summer sun," he sneered. "What?" he asked Thomas, "stagnant and drying out?" Thomas shrugged and gestured to Finnigan on his far side. Finnigan attempted to hide behind his book. "Ten points from Gryffindor," he said and was surprised to hear that his voice sounded, rather than his usual flippant and cold, rather exasperated. Too much time around Minerva, no doubt, he thought, grimly.

"As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted by Shakespeare and his paramour, I will assign chapters, you will read them. The next class, you will be prepared to discuss them at length and answer questions. Anyone answering more than one question incorrectly will be required to do the homework. Everyone will be participating. Potter, put that down." He had seen the motion out of the corner of his eyes, but it wasn't until he turned around completely that he realized Dumbledore's Golden Boy had actually taken his wand out of his pocket and sat it on his desk. "What is that for?"

"It was poking me," Potter said calmly. Snape stared at him. That was the irritating thing about Potter (one of the six thousand or so irritating things). You could, by sheer trickery, pull details out of him, but if he decided to lie to you, you really couldn't get the actual truth out of him. Even Dumbledore and the Dark Lord had run into this problem, but neither of them believed the other had the problem. Occlumency be damned - as usual, the child did it by sheer ignorance of the impossibility of it. Dumbledore had a distinct advantage in these situations - Potter felt no compunction about lying to the Dark Lord and his body language no longer betrayed him as it had when he was a child. Dumbledore usually could guilt the information out. Snape was, through his own actions, on the Voldemort end of the spectrum in Potter's universe. After a moment of using the technique that had worked before Potter became so damnably fearless, he turned away and looked back at the rest of the class.

Weasley had his wand out too, now, following Potter's lead. Granger's had been on the desk to start with - the girl was too intelligent to risk the delay. "Moving on from the typical Gryffindor hysterics," he said dryly as several of the other children twitched toward their wands. "We will be reviewing Chapter Three on the Magical Children Protection Acts at this time. Who can briefly - briefly, Miss Granger - summarize that act for the class."

Granger's glare caught his eyes for only a second, but the blow was almost physical and it was completely staggering. He took a second to glance around the room and selected Boot of Ravenclaw.

"Act I states that, as magic exists to protect the magical, it can and should be applied to magical children. It justifies, basically, the rest of the document which lays a series of charms on all magic children, preventing certain kinds of violence against children."

"Precisely. The charms prevent harm that can be prevented. An adult may punish you but not beat you severely - any attempt will produce a sharp electrical shock. You may wish to note this in defense of the underage. Once you reach seventeen, the geis is lifted. Mr. Potter, how is it formed?"

"It was created by Merlin and has been expanded by powerful wizards as the age of accountability has increased in the magic world."

"You should be more specific, Mr. Potter. Five points from Gryffindor." He looked, astonished, at the smile that appeared on Potter's face. It wasn't a nice smile, but it did seem to be somewhat relieved for some reason. Snape rolled his eyes. He fervently wished the floor would swallow him. Or, as he was a sensible person who rarely made silly mistakes anymore, he wished the floor would swallow THEM. A brief sigh, and his quizzing continued.

Hermione turned and smiled at Harry, who had stopped fingering his wand menacingly. It was Snape, she had told him, but Harry had to have proof. Harry grinned at her and turned to Ron to say something, but the tall redhead had gone stark white and his head was in his hand. Hermione frowned, and looked nervously around the room, searching for their impending doom.

Snape was quizzing the Ravenclaws about certain aspects of the Magical Children act (while welcome in many aspects, it also struck Hermione as somewhat invasive). Ron had turned toward the window and was gaping at it.

"Clause 7," Snape was clarifying, "prevents voluntary or involuntary procreation among magical children. The geis is lifted if marriage is accepted voluntarily by a child, but it is otherwise impossible to molest a magic child."

"Can still crucio one," Harry snarled. Hermione was about to reach over to comfort him when Snape rounded on him.

"Thank you, Mr. Potter," Snape snapped, his black eyes blazing and his chin held high. "This is an example of yet another reason why the unforgivable curses are referred to as 'unforgivable' - they can be utilized with impunity. Their use, even if they fail, is of course, subject to a term of stay in Azkaban prison."

Harry and Snape glared at each other, and even the air seemed to want to get out from between them. Their classmates were leaning over in their seats, watching as Harry started to get up. He seemed stuck somewhere in the process of jumping to his feet and providing a round example of things that weren't punishable by Azkaban but could still make a sensible person hate his life. Ron, who was usually the first now to talk sense into Harry, was not paying any attention, putting Hermione in what she felt was an awkward position.

The suggestion in her mind that she get between them scared her quite a bit. The second suggestion was one from her mad dreams of late, the idea of bringing Snape's head down to meet his full lips with her own, her eyes closing slowly under the onslaught of his warm, moist tongue...

Harry sat down. "Thank you, sir," he said through clenched teeth. "I really needed that imformation."

"Anytime, Potter," snarled Snape. "Ten points from Gryffindor for interrupting."

Harry nodded, and the class breathed a sigh of relief. Meanwhile, Hermione was sitting in her seat, gasping for breath, shaking her head and trying to figure out when she had gotten so insane. Snape didn't have full lips. He had thin, angry, almost snow white lips, and he was glaring at her with them right now.

Where did these stupid ideas come from? She wondered if maybe a romance novel had taken up residence in her head and was supplying random words that fit romances, but definately not the situation. She glared haughtily back at Snape, who ignored her completely. She looked around. Oh, he wasn't glaring at her, he was glaring at Ron.

Ron handed her a tawny school owl with a note tied to its leg and said, "Whatever you do, don't go without an escort."

Hermione stared at him and took the owl, working to get the note off its leg while Snape deducted more points from Ron for having an inexplicable owl in class. Hermione sighed. She would never admit it, not to anyone, not even to Harry, but this was one of the reasons she had recovered from their breakup so easily. Ever since the hideous encounter with the brains in the Department of Mysteries at the end of fifth year, Ron had acquired a pronounced tendancy to get weird some times, and what Muggles called a sixth sense (and wizards called second sight) that was both as random as Colin Creevy's personality and as mind-bogglingly accurate as Trelawney's wasn't. He had become a little more Luna-like than the stoic Hermione knew how to handle and so, though she loved him, she was happier to see him with someone who could truly understand him. Which she didn't, especially not right at this moment.

She opened the letter without hearing Snape, desperately afraid that something horrible had happened. How often did an owl turn up any time other than breakfast at Hogwarts when it hadn't been explicitly instructed to do. No, she only got owls from two places anymore, and it wasn't likely to be a good sign either way.

"I said, Miss Granger, what are you doing with an owl post in my class?" Snape's voice finally came through her distraction.

"I'm not sure, sir," she said. "It would be important, though, wouldn't it, to arrive so late in the day?"

"Then you'd best read it. That'll be another detention for you, Miss Granger, tomorrow evening, I think. Class dismissed."

As everyone filed out of the room, Ron and Harry leaned in on either side of Hermione to read the note over her shoulder, while Neville pulled up the nearest chair and waited patiently, too. Hermione carefully schooled her expression, hoping Snape would go away and let her be upset by whatever the news was in peace, but he stood there dithering with his books, picking at his robes, and generally making a nuisance of himself. Somewhere inside her, the mad woman who had written Snape in as the man of her dreams was delighted with this whole prospect. Hermione had been fighting her affection for him for years. This wasn't about to stop her.

As she read the letter, she was surprised to find that, while it was very important and time-sensitive, it wasn't something that couldn't wait until tomorrow morning. Unless maybe her parents thought she'd need extra time to make the decision, or arrangements or something.

"I'm sorry, Hermione," said Harry. "About your great-aunt and everything," he added in a quiet, sympathetic voice.

Hermione smiled at him, gratefully. "I never actually knew her, Harry. She was very very old when I was little - I used to go see her on holidays, but I haven't really talked to her in awhile."

Neville reached out a sympathetic hand and put it on her shoulder. They heard a loud noise from the front of the room. Snape had apparently dropped his books and was carefully picking them up. Hermione frowned. "She was always fond of me, though, you know. Said I looked like her little girl. Her "little girl" is older than my dad, I think."

Ron smiled. "Maybe there's wizard blood in your family, after all, Hermione. How old was she?"

"A hundred and one, mum's letter says," Hermione said. "Not old enough for wizard blood, Ron. Besides," she smiled a mischievious little smile and looked at all of them. "I am proud to be a pure Muggle-born."

Ron laughed and hugged her, Harry clapped her on the back. Snape dropped his books again. "Do you need some help with that, sir?" she asked sweetly.

He glared at her. "No, thank you, Miss Granger. Have you quite finished your so-called emergency missive?"

She looked at the boys and sighed. "Yes sir. There's been a death in my family, sir."

Snape blinked at her. "How unfortunate," he said, in a quiet tone that was probably the closest he could ever get to sympathy for a Gryffindor. "I suggest you meet with Professor Dumbledore tomorrow before your detention to make arrangements."

She nodded. "Thank you, sir," she said. Snape swooped out of the room, his robes billowing a black menace behind him as he stalked away. "And thank you so much for the detention. It's so kind and thoughtful of you to force me to clean cauldrons when I should probably be packing for a funeral."

Ron and Harry helped her to her feet and Neville grabbed her books. "Tell McGonagall," Ron suggested. "She won't let that sadistic old bat trap you for something you couldn't help."

Hermione sighed. She definitely couldn't tell them that she didn't mind being stuck in the room with Snape at all, anymore. She could dream about him so much better in his presence. There was something sensual, something wanton, something almost real to it with him in the same room while she fantasized about seductive gestures that brushed along his skin but never touched him. But the boys didn't need to know that, at all. They would probably rush her to the hospital wing immediately.

She shook her head as they headed back to Gryffindor tower. She wondered if any of them would still speak to her at all if she won what first her mind and now, apparently, her body as well, so desperately longed for. They only saw the lake, the water, the surface, which was black and angry and unforgiving. But somehow, against her will, she had gotten a view of everything beneath the face presented for the world, and it was a precious view that would not let her go. She shook her head and wondered whether they would hate her more than she would hate herself.

* * *

_duj - thanks for the note - I enjoyed fixing it in this singularly appropriate way._

Stay tuned for guest appearances from Ginny Weasley, Remus Lupin, Bellatrix LeStrange (boy, is she ever) and an alternate universe.


	11. Chapter 11: All of a Room

Longest update yet!Please review, I really want to hear from you, especially from my regulars, duj & Stormy.

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**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

_**Chapter 11: All of a Room**_

Ginny Weasley had often wondered if Hermione had any idea how many people loved her. The youngest Weasley had long been convinced that, even if they had to elect the Head Girl, Hermione would have won, simply because everyone, even the Slytherins, had come to admire her. Yes, the girl was tactless, and yes, she knew more than most of the rest of the seventh years, and no, she was not a glittering beauty. But for all her bluntness, she was kind; for all her knowledge, she tried desperately to share; and for all her ordinary looks, her heart sparkled through like a precious stone.

Ginny had wanted Hermione for her sister since she had heard of the muggle girl from Ron, just from the fact that she had trumped him on the very first train ride. For years, she had suspected that Hermione would become her sister-in-law eventually, and the way she and Ron loved each other was, even now, deep and enduring, although it was completely platonic. No one in the family understood Ron anymore, though, except Harry, and Ron's heart had moved on. Watching Hermione as they waited in Dumbledore's office, though, Ginny now realized that she would always have Hermione as a sister, but never as a sister-in-law. There was something haunted in Hermione's eyes, and Ginny knew that look better than anyone, as she had worn it herself until this summer. Someone had stolen the brilliant girl's heart while no one was looking, and Ginny knew from the sadness and bewilderment that whoever it was, he was unlikely to be the sort of person to earn what he had stolen or to try to deserve what had been given to him freely.

Had they been alone together, Ginny would have demanded the answers right then. As the crowd that had accidentally converged on Dumbledore's office to show their support of Hermione included two professors, there was nothing she could do about it right now, except let the list of candidates in her head continue.

"Dumbledore should be here soon," Harry whispered comfortingly. The original trio was sitting together on a bench Harry had conjured just in front of Dumbledore's desk.

"Shame you can't tell what HE'S doing, mate," said Ron. Harry grinned.

"Whatever it is, I'm sure it's brilliant and inexplicable," Hermione said softly. "He needs to hurry, I'll be late for detention."

McGonagall heard that. "Did I hear correctly that you have detention, Miss Granger?"

Hermione nodded vaguely. "Professor Snape gave it to me, it's the second one I've had this week."

Professor Vector shook her head and rolled her elegant eyes. "One of these days," she grumbled, "someone is going to force that man to be pleasant and he'll choke on it."

"Fudge, hopefully," Ron muttered. "Take the smarmy twerp with him."

Ginny narrowed her eyes. There was something decidedly off about the way Hermione was reacting to this detention. The Hermione who Ginny had known for the past six years would have been raging. It was just completely out of character for Hermione to sensibly decide that school issues weren't life-threatening catastrophes.

There was no further time for contemplation, as Dumbledore arrived just then in a fire ball, holding Fawkes by the tail. "Ah," he said, "I see we are all here, good." The phoenix swept by Harry and brushed him with scarlet wing tips, then flew to a golden perch in the corner of the room. Meanwhile, Dumbledore walked around his desk and picked up a silver candy dish, which he immediately passed around.

"I shouldn't," said Hermione as she immediately popped one in her mouth. "My parents will have your head for subverting my five-thousand pound smile, Professor," she added cheerfully as she stuck a second sherbert lemon in her pocket.

Dumbledore smiled indulgently at her. Ginny rather suspected that he had a soft spot for the genius girl. "If that is all your parents want my head for, I think I've done a very good job with you," he said. He smiled at the room full of Gryffindors, Ravenclaws, and professors, and accepted his candy dish back from Neville (who hadn't dropped it, not even once.) When he looked up from putting it away, his face had gone very serious and his eyes weren't twinkling so much this time.

"Miss Granger, I would have to say, normally, that I could not allow you to leave the school at this time. I have several people watching the movements of various Death Eaters and Voldemort" - the room gave a collective gasp and Ginny rolled her eyes - "and they are reporting that the danger to a muggleborn witch of your caliber would be rather great. I've just come from Headquarters, and we don't see a clear way around it."

Hermione nodded. "I was afraid you'd say that, Professor. I'll have to write my parents and tell them to work it out with the solicitors or something. Apparently, there's a will involved and I'm supposed to be there."

Ron looked up from his hands, suddenly and put a hand on Hermione's shoulder. "How about an escort, Professor," he suggested. "She shouldn't miss her inheritance because of these stupid, evil gits. If they have their way in the world, she may need it."

Harry nodded. "Send her with someone they won't want to attack, Professor," he said.

Ginny glared a hole in the back of the boys' heads. Their little speech here smelled of some sort of conspiracy.

Dumbledore smiled and twinkled all of the sudden. He looked at the two boys and nodded as if they had suddenly pronounced the Lost Prophecies of Merlin. "Excellent idea, Mr. Potter, Mr. Weasley." He rose. "Come, Miss Granger. I believe you have a detention in fifteen minutes. I shall escort you." Without another word, he escorted Hermione out the door while the others stared incredulously after him.

Ginny rapped her fingers on her chair arm, listening to the steady rhythm slowly quickening as she thought about how irritated she was, while the rest cleared out the room, muttering and gossipping and looking confused. When it was only she and the two boys left, she stood up as if to go, feeling them watching her and silently congratulating themselves behind her back. When she reached the door, she rounded on them with her wand in her hand. "Alright," she snapped, "spill, or it's great flapping bogeys the size of Snape for both of you."

* * *

"You are late, again, Miss Granger," said Severus, without looking up from his desk. "Can you not walk down to the dungeon without getting lost, or is this an indication of something more sinister?"

Dumbledore smiled. Here was Severus at his snarky best, trying to pretend like he hadn't been looking forward to Miss Granger's company for the evening. Dumbledore was pleased that Severus was on the verge of finding a friend in Miss Granger, even if it would doubtlessly take the Gryffindor girl another seven years to even get him on a first name basis. Still, there was nothing wrong with students and teachers making friends, and if ever someone needed a friend, it was the spiteful Slytherin Potions Master.

"I'm sorry to say, Severus," he said, "that it is the more sinster one."

Severus's head shot up and his eyes narrowed. Dumbledore continued to smile as a look of distress appeared on Snape's pale face. He was not happy, Dumbledore read, with this turn of events, and was even more displeased because of his failure to see it coming.

"Miss Granger is not lost - she was slowed by an elderly wizard on a leisurely stroll. I trust you have everything in order?" He gestured at the "Encyclopaedia Esoterica" on the corner of Snape's desk.

Severus frowned. "I was planning to utilize Miss Granger's precise diction and incessant prattle to aide my research," he said with a shrug.

Hermione tightened her hand very carefully on Dumbledore's arm. Dumbledore felt her stiffen and shook his head tiredly. "Unfortunately, your research will have to wait. You and Miss Granger will need to make travel plans. She is not licensed to apparate and the Knight Bus is entirely too visible. I expect Miss Granger will be adequately equipped to suggest Muggle transport to get you both to your destination."

"I beg your pardon?" said Severus, and the tone of his voice amused Dumbledore, even as it apparently startled Miss Granger. Surprised, Snape sounded almost exactly like anyone else, as his voice lost all traces of the customary anger or sarcasm.

"You will be escorting Miss Granger to her family tomorrow. She will remain there through the funeral and legal proceedings until Tuesday. You will be her companion and will protect her. Your presence will probably suffice to keep those who would endanger her at bay, so I expect you'll want to be particularly visible. But you'll need Muggle clothes."

Severus gaped at him, too stunned to speak. Dumbledore smiled mischeiviously and decided to pretend he didn't know this was bothering the younger man. "I see that you are excited and looking forward to your vacation, so I'll just leave you and Miss Granger to the planning. Be cautious, of course, both of you, but try to have a pleasant time, even on such a sad occasion in such grim times as these."

They both nodded, open mouthed and appalled, at him, so he turned and left too quickly for them to gather their wits and argue.

Snape picked up the heavy tome from the corner of his desk. "Study this," he said calmly and handed it to her, careful to ensure that their eyes never met.

The Head Girl smiled and nodded and busied herself by trying to tuck the new book in among the vast selection she already carried in her bag. Finally, in frustration, she snapped an engorgement spell at the bag. The first one misfired and only made the handle too large. The second was perfect and meant that Snape had time to dawdle with the items on his desk while she rearranged her things.

When his patience could take it no more, he looked up to snap at the girl, only to find her waiting silently, her eyes downcast in a gesture that was strangely too trusting to be submissive. He rolled his eyes. "Where do you live, Miss Granger?"

"Stratford-on-Avon," she said. "We can probably..."

Snape held up a hand and interrupted her. "There will be no problem, Miss Granger. I will meet you in the Entrance Hall tomorrow morning at 7."

"But I can..."

"Miss Granger," he said, coldly, "I have been traveling the length and breadth of this country for far longer than the magical world has been plagued by your existence. I am certain I can find my way to any place as well without magic as with it, and all without your know-it-all help. You may leave now."

She stared at him for a moment, her eyes wide and blazing, her skin pale and taut. He refused to back down, gazed at her with cold contempt, feeling his lip start to curl into his habitual sneer. Her lip started to tremble and he felt the sneer only grow more pronounced.

Then, there was nothing. She nodded at him with eyes so cold they could touch his own with frost, and then she turned and left.

He went to his chambers and packed his things, careful to take more than he usually would in case he ended up unable to use magic at any point. He pulled out a small travel guide from his vast bookcase and sat in his chair to read it.

He briefly considered their travel route and finally, in an excess of frustration, flung the guide down and picked up the book he was reading for entertainment, a collection of potions accidents and anecdotes. It held his interest briefly, but failed to keep it. What interested him more was the feeling of guilt. It crawled over him, infested him, dragged him down. Due to his other occupation, he was quite accustomed to feelings of guilt, but this was completely beyond his experience. Never had he felt anything but a sort of calm satisfaction in insulting a Gryffindor, any Gryffindor, and Granger had always been a particularly loud little target. How, then, was he now worried what Hermione might think, what Hermione might feel?

Five minutes of frustrated contemplation got him no where. Snape finally rolled his eyes and decided to himself that he was not guilty but nervous about McGonagall and her ultimatum. If Miss Granger went to the stern animagus for help, he would be roasted for dinner and fed to dragons. With that strangely comforting realization, he sighed and relaxed, giving in to his other desperate feeling of the moment - exhaustion.

He had no sooner closed his eyes than everything behind them exploded inside his head.


	12. Chapter 12: A River Below

The first time I want to update quickly, and they're down. I ask you. :-)

Thanks to all of you for the reviews, I'm looking forward to your opinion, so review, review, review.

Chapter 13 should be up soon, so don't let that stop you.

Thanks!**

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Touch the Air Softly

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

_**Chapter 12: A River Below**_

Harry shrugged at Ginny, but she glared back unflinchingly at them both. He turned to grimace at Ron who sighed back at him and put his head in his hands. "She thinks we don't know her," Ron said softly.

Harry nodded. "But we've been around her almost constantly for seven years now. We know her better than her parents, better than her muggle friends, better than anybody, even you Ginny, sorry."

Ginny waved a hand in dismissal; she knew that, even if it wasn't pretty coming from boys. "Get on with it," she said, grimly. "What's your point?"

"That is the point," said Ron. "Look, she thinks we can't tell, but we can, she's just that transparent."

"We've talked about it," said Harry, "and we've agreed that we hate it and we hate him, and there's nothing we can do about it, because we love Hermione. And we want to keep her happy, so if she wants him, we're going to be good friends about it instead of, well, like we usually are."

Ginny considered this, briefly. She was honestly considering being proud of them. They were really growing up, making their decisions based on better things then their own selfishness. "Fine," she said, lowering her wand. "But who are we talking about that Hermione wants?"

Ron shrugged at Harry who shrugged back at Ron. They looked apprehensive and Harry finally said, "I wish we were wrong."

"I still think she's bewitched," Ron agreed.

"By who?" she demanded, frantically. She looked like her mother in ferocious rabid beast mode, only scared, also.

Harry sighed. "Wish I knew, they'd really have to pay for this one."

"Yeah, don't think we'd let it slide, our best friend, our SISTER, being taken with a Slytherin who's way too old for her."

Ginny's expression was horrified, but what scared Harry the most was not that she looked surprised - she didn't. She looked like she had just had the most awful theory she could imagine confirmed. "Surely," she said softly, then stopped to clear her throat. She licked her lip. "Surely, it's just some crush," Ginny whispered.

Harry nodded, sadly. He wasn't sure, and he could tell Ginny wasn't sure either and they were both reassuring each other because they could. "It'll pass, then," he said.

"And if it doesn't?"

Ron smiled a decidedly wicked smile. "Then he'd better learn to be nice to Gryffindors after all."

Ginny's wand slipped from her grip and, thanks to a quick gesture from her brother, she sat down hard on a straight backed kitchen chair, instead of the floor. "I don't believe it, I just didn't want to believe it, I won't believe it," she whispered over and over again, frantically. Finally she looked up into the concerned faces of the two boys she loved best. "And if he hurts her?"

Harry's green eyes turned cold and stormy as the lake in a blizzard and blinked at her. "Then neither Voldemort nor Dumbledore can save him from me."

"Too right," agreed her brother. And they meant it.

* * *

Hermione walked through the common room, waving distractedly at everyone, pretending to be concentrating on a problem. To Harry and Ron, she spoke reassuringly, promising to meet them early for breakfast and insisting she had to pack and go to bed early. When she got to her curtained four-poster, she did gesture her kit into her bag, and the book Snape had lent her, but no clothes, since she would be wearing the muggle clothes she had at home. As soon as she could, though, she closed the curtains to her bed, cast a silencing charm on them, and lay back on her pillows.

Agony washed over her, a piercing, gut-wrenching pain that ached and stabbed and seared all at once. Her face was wet with tears, her nose was running like a tap. Her head felt like a broom accident up-side her skull. But the physical pain was only a symptom of the fact that she was dying, dying of love, and the thundering in her skull was the echo of her breaking heart. She was in hell, she knew it, and it would never get any better. He hated her, would always treat her with the cold contempt which was all his kind felt for her kind. She was nothing to him, probably not even human. And, oh, how that tore her apart, more surely than the bitter sobs that ripped free of her chest every few seconds.

She had seen Ginny weep over heartbreaks, had watched Ron choke like this with the bitter ashes that their failed romance had left in his taste, had seen Harry suffer like this in moments of blackest despair. And she couldn't believe, now, that she had ever considered that any of them might be over-reacting in their pain. This was going to kill her, she could feel it.

This went on for some time, while her mind and her body and her heart fought each other, trying to fathom how Hermione Granger, who was many things, but none of them was usually silly, had come to this point. How could she be in love with the dark and sinister professor? She knew, now, that it was love, because there was nothing in the world else that could make describing the feeling as "pain" an understatement. She curled up in a tight ball of misery and hugged her pillow close, waiting out the hiccups, now that the sobs had passed.

A series of flashbacks hit her, all involving him. She was 11 and waving her hand, standing on her tiptoes in his dismal classroom, desperate to show that hers was a rare mind, worthy of his attention. She was thirteen and stealing from him, knowing it was wrong, hoping they could make it up to him later when he wouldn't know. She was fourteen and a crush on him had ambushed her one night in June, making her strangely scared and more strangely ecstatic. She was fifteen and running away from yet another of his cold, tasteless insults, despairing that he would ever consider her anything but a kicking post. She was sixteen and defending him to her friends. She was...

She was nineteen and dancing in his arms, celebrating the fall of the Dark Lord, and reveling, blissful, in both their survivals. They talked softly together, debating the practical application of wartime things no longer needed, and they were both smiling as they whispered.

She was twenty-five and walking down a rose laden aisle, wearing heavy white dress robes with layers and layers of gown underneath. Her father held her arm and she clutched a white bouquet, all tricked out in scarlet, green, and silver. It was Midsummer's Eve and he was waiting for her, hair pulled back, eyes bright and curious. Completely, warmly, in love. She took his hand and turned to face Dumbledore, who nodded benevolently and began to speak.

She was twenty-nine and heavily pregnant, being carried back from Hogsmeade by her husband, because she had turned her ankle chasing Harry Potter's little Weasley brats away from teasing Ron's tiny daughter. He was chiding her in professorial tones, but every word rang with love and with concern and with desperate fear.

She was thirty-three and the mother of two, clutching her husband's hand to comfort him as he learned from Neville Longbottom that one of his favorite old pupils had been killed trying to escape Azkaban. Neville and Harry were both surprisingly kind about it as they apparated away, leaving her love shaking and guilty in her arms.

She was forty-eight and they were sitting at the kitchen table, talking quietly over nothing, gentle, together. Their hands touched as they moved things around, as they rose from the table. He washed the dishes, she dried them, humming along to the cheerful tune he caroled at the sun rising just outside their window.

She was fifty-six and planning his retirement party. They were fighting in the den, their voices ringing out hoarse and angry as they called each other names and flung accusations back and forth at each other. "Arrogant, mean, old bastard!" "Stubborn, irritating know-it-all!" She broke down in tears and then, so did he, and he caught her to him and held her fiercely, gasping apologies between her own, kissing her face, kissing her hair.

She was sixty-seven and becoming Headmistress of Hogwarts, while her proud husband, their children, their grandchildren, looked on. She remembered Albus and Minerva when she spoke to accept - and he remembered them with tears she felt so proud to see.

She was eighty-three and watching from the circle of her husband's arms as Harry sadly instructed their young grandson in the way his life would go from here. "Youth cannot know..." Harry was saying, softly, and her husband looked on, fierce with pride and sorrow, watching the new champion rise.

She was ninety five and waiting for him. When they brought him in, her heart wrenched, but she would have to be strong and remember that there were always reasons to celebrate, even if there were always reasons to wear black.

* * *

The explosion brought Snape exactly where one might have expected to be after such an event - to his casket. It was black, trimmed in silver, and there was half a Slytherin seal on the half of the lid that was down. Nerving himself up, he looked inside, to find that his head rested on white satin cushions and that he wore, not his customary black, but Slytherin green robes, richly tailored and trimmed in silver. But what surprised him was that he was not looking in on his present sarchastic, haughty face, but on that of a dignified old man, his hooked nose rising from a face that looked both regal and strangely gentle.

Watching his funeral felt like watching James Potter's - like a great man, admired and respected, had been taken away from a world that loved him. Severus Snape stared in awe as the crowds passed to pay their respects to his sad-faced widow who wore her hair pinned up like Minerva's, and who kept her eyes dry and admiring. She was trembling, though, a fragile little witch who looked both stern and delicate. But there was still something of the soft little girl around her nose and her stance, and he could only stare at her in shock, watching their lives together roil in her eyes.

They were standing under a Hogwarts sunset and he dropped to his knee to ask her, knowing that her answer must be no, knowing that she had to have learned better by now. She flung her arms around him and sang out the last word he expected to hear, the one he wanted the most, and she would never know how many different ways she had saved his life in that instant.

He was holding their first born child, looking from mother to daughter through eyes glassy with tears and laughter. The first word his child ever heard from him was her mother's name as he gave it to her, too, the most wonderful word he knew.

He was ill in bed, sick and angry and feeling quite sulky, while his wife tried to coax him to have some chicken soup, at least, to take care of himself a little bit for her and their children. He pouted and complained but she bribed him with smiles and caresses and he could never say no to her as a smile peeked through and he ate his soup.

They were standing by the grave of their fourth child, too small to breathe even one breath of earthly air. A sorrow that could easily have torn them apart, it brought them together instead, clutching each other for support when all the world seemed to have crashed down around them.

They were holding each other for support again when their only son announced that he would be wed to Ron Weasley's daughter, a child of only thirteen. They were still holding on ten years later when he made that fierce and unlikely promise come true.

They were alone together again at last and still so in love, they still got found in broomclosets by the seventh years. She would laugh merrily when this happened and take great humor at him covering his chagrin by taking points from the houses.

They fought and they laughed and they argued and they loved, and they came at last to this point, where she bent, sobbing, over his casket, the love she held for him so deep it broke his heart as much as hers, and filled them both with transcendent joy. She was everything to him, Harry Potter was saying behind her, that his wife was his only world.

Snape watched her, the feelings aching inside him, astounded and appalled that such a heart-wrenching emotion could come from nothing more than hallucination. But what precious and dear imagings they were, making him lonely and hopeful in ways that he used to be certain he had forgotten. Her emotion was a river below the surface, washing away a thousand sins in its pure, rushing flow.

The mourners faded around them, the scene bleeding away into a dark background, the casket fading more slowly. The whole world blacked out to just Snape and Hermione, then the years fell away from her and left her to lay on her four-post bed, her hair a wild cascade around her. He looked down on the girl and knew, suddenly and without a doubt that her love could have saved him, if only he had known...

He reached out a hand to touch her and instead touched only air. He brushed it along the shape of her shoulders and wished with all his heart to wake up dead.

Instead, he just woke up.


	13. Chapter 13: Swing Gently

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**

* * *

Chapter 13: Swing Gently**

When Snape came up from the dungeons, he found the group of Gryffindors (and Weasley's Ravenclaw girlfriend) crowded around the Head Girl, wishing her well, offering her advice and comfort, and it almost enraged him. He wasn't a mad slasher, after all, even if he was the evil Potion's master. He towered over Ginny Weasley, the smallest of them, and waited for them to notice him.

None of them said anything to him, but hugged the girl as though she was going to the gallows and walked away one at a time. Potter whispered something that made her laugh, and the Weasley girl whispered something that made her blush. He thought she looked surprisingly different when all flustered with her cheeks red and her entourage elsewhere. He snapped "25 points from Gryffindor" after Potter, who waved carelessly back at him. Granger looked up at him disapprovingly and headed out the door without glancing back to see if he was following.

Dumbledore must have asked Hagrid to arrange something, because one of the thestral-drawn carriages was waiting for them. Snape knew it was polite, so he offered her his hand to step up into the carriage. She took it gingerly and clambered up, releasing him as quickly as possible and taking her seat to stare at her hands as the coach rolled down the drive.

Snape watched the thestral move through the window over Granger's head, and tried to figure out something to say to her, something to tell her that she was safe from him being such a cold bastard to her, and that he was not really as evil as he tended to behave. He looked down at her and found her pulling her hair out of her face, as it whipped around in the wind from the carriage's passage. He rolled his eyes. "I see, Miss Granger, that you still have no concept of practicality where your hair is concerned. Do put it up, won't you?" Inside he was shouting at himself. Why did he always say things like that to her?

She looked up at him and her brown eyes were ablaze again, like last night. This time, though, it appeared that he had finally hit her last nerve. "Professor Snape, if there is anything you can do about your teeth, I suggest you do it. If not, my parents are professionals, and they'll be delighted to help."

He recoiled as though slapped. In fact, he felt he might have been happier if she had slapped him. Without apparently realizing the significance of it, she had pulled down years of difference between them, and showed him exactly the sort of bully he was.

They rode in bitterly uncomfortable silence all the way into Hogsmeade and down to catch the train. He had no idea what was on her mind, but what was on his was the glaring irony of finally seeing himself in the mirror she held up. It was not a pretty sight, a grown man who behaved with all the rank and glaring childishness of the eleven year olds under his tutelage, and their petty, juvenile insults. "I see no difference..." he thought to himself and winced as the memory of that poorly behaved encounter rolled over him time and again. Her face, he realized, had never looked so much hurt or insulted as betrayed, and now he began to suspect he knew why.

As they got onto the train, he escorted her to a private compartment and put down his bag. As soon as they were moving, he left her without a word. If she looked up at this, he didn't know - he was too caught up in his own thoughts to even consider it.

* * *

Hermione looked up as he left and gratefully dove for her bag, pulling her books out and throwing them on the seat next to her, determined that she would neither look at nor speak to him even once for the rest of the train ride. She had no idea where this train was even heading and if he got them lost in London or South Wales, she would call her parents to rescue her and just leave him wherever his arrogance took him. She was beginning to wonder if Dumbledore and the boys hated her to put her in this situation with that stubborn, evil man.

She opened the Encyclopaedia Esoterica and started reading about potions made with demiguise fur, determined to look like she was paying attention to it, even if her mind was a million miles away.

The problem, of course, was the dreams from last night and the feeling she had that everything should have worked out between them but hadn't. The first thing that bothered her about that was simple. Before all this craziness started, around her birthday this year, she hadn't really remembered her dreams very often, except for her nightmares. None of this would have been called a nightmare - well, maybe if Ron was having them, or Harry, but she had entertained her silly girlish crush for years before this.

The second problem was simply how disturbing the Snape in her dreams was. While he was completely out of character for the snarky git who had just deserted her, in the dream, the way he had behaved had made perfect sense. That Hermione had learned to see past his dark facades, that Snape had made actual effort to become her friend. It was strange, it was unlikely, but it had felt so right and so real, as if that man was actually hiding behind the cold, black eyes of this one, peeking out at her, but only when she wasn't conscious of it.

The third, and possibly most difficult part of the problem was manifestly what they had shared. The images before last night, from the first one she remembered right through to the strange ideas that had plagued her in class all that very day, were of fantasies, not romantic ones, but sexual ones, based entirely off desire and passion, and requiring very little more feeling than longing. But the emotions that drove this newest set of images were more real, with depth and endurance that the passion simply could not have summoned.

She sighed and sank into her book, drowning out the voices clamoring in her head. There was very little sympathy in her for rank folly, even if it was her own. She was a child, and she loved a bitter fool, and she had no idea how or why, but Hermione Granger had learnt anything she set out to do, and she would just have to learn to live with it.

When Snape returned about an hour later, she read patiently through the sound of him shuffling around the carriage, the sounds of things crinkling, bags moving, parchment crackling, and Snape muttering quietly to himself. The sound was reassuring. She hadn't realized how worried she had been until she had to stifle a sigh of relief at the sound of his voice. She forced herself not to look up at him and, especially, not to argue with him about their route. It would take all day by train, whereas by car, they could have been there in a few hours.

When all was finally quiet, she risked a peek up at him, to find him dressed in muggle clothes - and looking very strange for it - and reading a book of similar size to her own. There was, strangely, a tin of biscuits lying on the seat next to her, in chocolate no less. She looked at it, bewildered. Snape never said a word, but seemed to sense her confusion and gestured at the tin in what, from anyone else, would have been an invitation.

For one hysterical moment, she wondered if he had poisoned them. After that, she tried to decide if he actually was Severus Snape and not some Death Eater impersonator. This was serious. His hair had been pulled back neatly in ponytail not unlike the one Bill wore - or Lucius Malfoy, she thought with a shudder. His clothes were tasteful and immaculate - the sort her father wore when her parents met the bankers. Just seeing Snape in a white shirt was astonishing enough without the embellishment of a fine silk tie with a diamond studded clip. She narrowed her eyes and studied the tie until she realized that it was a Slytherin tie, obviously designed to match the school ties, but suit the professors from that house, or possibly just the Head of House. Of course, if any of the other professors had been in Slytherin, she wasn't aware of it, except maybe Vector or Sinistra. Certainly Trelawney hadn't been, the silly old fraud.

Snape noticed her concerned glance and rolled his eyes. "The Headquarters," he whispered, "of the Order of the Phoenix can be found at #12 Grimmauld Place, London."

It was simple, but it was brilliant. The dilapidated old house was under the Fidelius Charm still, and only the secret keeper could say a word about it, except to those already in on the secret. Only Snape could have told her, and only she could have been told - the simple sentence verified both of them. She beamed at him and was, surprisingly, awarded with the briefest flicker of a smile.

An old man huffed into the compartment with two very young children in tow. Hermione stared blankly at them but Snape rolled his eyes, rose, and lifted Hermione's books from the seat beside her. He sat himself next to her quietly enough but, from the thunderous expression on his face, one would have thought he'd been asked to sit next to a Marauder. Lupin would probably be the right one, because something in the pained furrow of his brow seemed to suggest that his seatmate might at any moment decide to bite him.

Their new companion took a seat and watched them owlishly for a moment, while his young charges glared at him and whispered to each other alternately. The littler of the two girls leaned up to whisper to the old man and he smiled in that gracious way adults have with ill-mannered children. "Why don't you ask them yourself?" he rumbled, a deep bass noise that seemed impossible to come from such a wizened, frail old creature.

"I'll do it," said the older girl. "Who are you? I'm Antigone Devereux and this is my sister Portia and my grandpa, Dr. Aristotle Devereux and we're here from America to see everything, and you two look like you're here to see ghosts, so who are you?"

Hermione and Snape exchanged a quick glance, shrugged at each other and then Hermione turned back to the child. "Jane Grange," she said. "I'm accompanying Professor Snape on a business trip."

Snape nodded and seemed quite pleased with her conclusion. Hermione felt his vague approval as deeply as if he had awarded her ten points to Gryffindor in front of the whole school. "We're both familiar with your work, of course, Doctor Devereux," said Snape politely to the older gentleman.

Hermione smiled at the children. "But I'm afraid we were unaware that you had such charming assistants."

"It's ok," Antigone explained in her piping American drawl. "I'm only getting started in the field, but I can already brew a simple restorative draught."

Hermione smiled at her fondly. "I'm sure it will all come to you when you're older, dear."

"I'm eight," the girl said, obviously completely wounded. Her sister had yet to say anything, only sucked her thumb with great determination.

Antigone looked for a moment to become completely belligerent, but Hermione hadn't had to deal with an angry child since fifth year, and didn't know how to get out of it. To her lifelong astonishment, it was Snape who came to her rescue and what he said would have caused her to pull her wand on him had she not already verified his identity incontrovertibly.

"Miss Grange is one of the brightest rising stars in the field, Miss Devereux, but even she was in second year before should could brew a Polyjuice Potion."

"Second year?" said Antigone and Dr. Devereux as one, though obviously for different reasons.

"Second year is," Hermione counted on her fingers, "Sixth Grade."

"Wow!" breathed Antigone and looked ready to launch into yet another of her speeches, but Dr. Devereux interrupted.

"I see your students continue to impress the world, Severus." At Snape's start, the old man smiled a knowing smile. "Oh, yes. Three of my apprentices have studied under you, and I've had great success with each of them. Pity I retired - the brightest star would be something truly to be seen. Though you'll want to be careful not to lavish such praise on her regularly, or it will surely go to her head."

Hermione forced herself not to roll her eyes. She had gotten this all the time at home when young - adults talking like she wasn't there simply because she was the topic of conversation. "I assure you, Doctor, Professor Snape wouldn't dream of such a thing."

They talked for perhaps a half hour about the arts and sciences of Potion-making at its best, and the only down side was finding themselves stopping every other sentence to endure a lengthy, breathless, and unnecessary lecture on something they all understood from the boisterous Antigone.

Finally, the door to the cabin opened again, and an elderly woman, neither frail nor infirm, strode in with her head held high and her eyes bright and angry. "There you are. Ari, how often do I have to tell you not to wander off with these children? Oh, goodness, and you've been boring these good people, too, and they on a holiday, for shame, Ari, how could you?" It suddenly became very clear where Antigone's speech pattern and habits had come from.

"Doctor Devereux and Professor Snape were just discussing fire technique," said Hermione brightly. "They both seem quite pleased with the discussion."

The woman smiled at her. "Poor dear, have you had to endure this claptrap, then?" And she clucked sympathetically and did fully five minutes on how sad it was that Hermione had to listen to such things, it was bad enough that Antigone had started to pick it up, all the time smiling and nodding as the two men continued a conversation Hermione really wanted to join. "And interrupting your quality time, too, I see," she concluded at last, noting the books. "Come along, Ari, bring the children and allow these young people to return to their business." She beamed at both of them with a too-happy smile that implied knowledge of all manner of things.

"Madam," said Snape, in that snide sneer he usually saved for Harry and Neville, "I assure you that my student and myself were quite interested in Dr. Devereux's conversation. However, we are grateful for his time and should be getting back to Miss Grange's lessons."

"Lessons," chirped the old woman. "Of course, how silly of me." As she bundled the children out, Snape rose and assisted Doctor Devereux to the door. "Thank you, have a delightful trip. So nice to see young people so happy," she said and faded into the distance.

"My apologies," Doctor Devereux boomed. "I'll owl you that formula, Severus, it's been a pleasure meeting you at last. Don't mind Electra, she's just silly. Though she is correct that it's nice to see young people happy, especially in times like these."

Snape closed the door behind them finally and slumped against it.

Hermione looked up at him with wide, astounded eyes. "Please, sir, please tell me I wasn't like that!"

Snape straightened, then looked at her very seriously. "Miss Granger," he said, "in your worst moments, when I despaired of ever gaining your silence, I only once invented undetectable ways to slip you silencing draughts."

"And for these two?"'

"Four a minute," he said, honestly.

She smiled. Then, before she knew it, she was laughing. "'I love seeing happy people,'" she chirped in a high, false voice.

Snape looked at her and, for her second shock that hour, grinned broadly at her. It was a nice grin, friendly and absolutely free of any of his usual taints of sneers, snarls, or maliciousness. "I suppose one of us should apologize for that error," he said, when they had finally settled to straight faces.

Hermione picked up her book and buried her face in it, afraid to remind the professor that he didn't have to sit beside her anymore because she wanted him to so much. "Yeah," she agreed. "I vote Professor Dumbledore."

Snape's snort of laughter promised that this trip wouldn't kill them both after all.

It was another ten minutes before she realized what he'd said about the Polyjuice Potion.

* * *

The next two hours crawled by at a pace that Hermione rarely experienced, especially while reading. She remembered with a shudder her days with the time turner and wondered if those borrowed hours were finally catching up with her, all at once, standing between her and the end of this miserable trip.

It was miserable, too. At first, it was only faint - the barest hint of random spice and something like dark magic, a whiff of a fragrance that brushed her nostrils like the first snow of winter. Slowly, the scent coalesced into the backdrop of her dreams, an evocative smell that was both foreign and familiar. She inhaled shallowly but the air, though only lightly dusted with it, was becoming charged by it. Closing her eyes kept it closer instead of further away, but she couldn't find it in herself to push it away, even a little.

She faded away into quiet dreams of them, together, making potions, working on formula, teaching children, living life. The pictures were as deep as her dreams, but also touched by the wicked feeling inside her that the one she wanted slept quietly beside her, and that a simple touch would be just the easiest thing in the world.

There was an abrupt jarring as she thought this. Or perhaps the hardest thing in the world, since he would leave her immediately, and she didn't think she could bear the loss.

"Wake up, Miss Granger," said Snape. "We've arrived."

Hermione looked up and realized, to her dismay, that she had her head on Snape's shoulder.

"Come along," he snapped briskly. Groggily, she rose to follow him.


	14. Chapter 14: Dust the Grey Mountains

**I want to thank everyone for the great reviews, and the insightful and thoughtful information. I appreciate your confidence in this story and hope you continue to enjoy it. Please let me know, and if there's anything wrong with these people, please let me know.****

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**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**

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Chapter 14: Sweep the Grey Mountains**

Snape waited quietly in the study for Miss Granger to return. When they had arrived at the end of their tedious and exhausting trip, she had effectively smuggled him into the house, past the curious eyes of the trickle of visitors leaving and entering the place. He was somewhat amused by this, but pleased, too. He was disinterested in becoming a spectacle, out of his element and in clothes he wore maybe once in the past five years.

Miss Granger had gone to speak to her parents, she said, in a voice that he was convinced was trying to cover up something, and had stowed him out of the way in a study or library near the main entrance. He was nervous to have her out of his sight for even this long - Dumbledore would never forgive him if something untoward happened to the girl. And he would never forgive himself. But she had insisted on talking to her parents alone and he certainly couldn't object to that, even though he knew she was up to something.

To still his nerves, he busied himself by studying his surroundings, trying to decipher the intriguing muggle books from their bindings alone. They held his gaze for only a very few minutes before he was pulled away by the large painting hanging over a fireplace that would have looked at home in a wizard's manor.

The painting was of a family grouping - a pair of parents who appeared to be around Snape's own age, a very little girl with ringlets in the ponytails pulled up on both sides of her head, and a young woman who looked almost exactly like Miss Granger as she did now, except that this girl had different eyes, and perhaps a more slender face.

He looked around at all the various pictures that accompanied that portrait, all covering that wall and realized that the littlest girl had eventually grown into the Gryffindor who was the bane of his existence. Curiosity gnawed at him. Who was the older girl, why were there no further pictures of her?

Several moments of investigation revealed her to be Gertrude, Hermione's sister. He had wondered for a moment if she was actually the girl's mother, but the articles he found tucked away from most prying eyes (though not his; the eyes of a spy were particularly good for minding other peoples' business for them) disabused him quickly of all notions where the woman was concerned.

She had been gone since Hermione was a little child. He read the statements, "Surrey Woman Dead in Mysterious Accident" and the date and realized with horror that the unfortunate creature had probably been killed by Death Eaters. He read deeper into the article and sighed when he found it - a small artistic morbidity that told him everything. Bellatrix.

"I was at day care, and my parents were at their office," whispered a sad little voice behind him. Even years and lack of knowledge couldn't conceal the evident grief. "I don't think I really remember her, but I can't forget her either."

Snape looked up at the quiet little grouping. Was there no one that Voldemort and his wretched followers had left alone? Did any family in the world anywhere survive that war with peace? "No more you should, Miss Granger," he said carefully. "The dead are only gone when they are forgotten." He turned to watch her fight her tears and watched the brave Gryffindor spirit raise her chin and sparkle in her eyes.

"My parents are expecting us for dinner, sir," she said. "This way, please."

He followed her all the way out into a different hallway when it occurred to him that something was very wrong and that the girl was trying to tell him, but couldn't see how to do it. "Miss Granger?" he asked, stopping her in a rather fancifully decorated little alcove off of what looked to be a back door into the family gardens.

She looked up at him. "I... I told them you're interested in a muggle funeral, sir," she said and her stance was screaming fear and worry and a deep-seated self-consciousness that he couldn't really explain. She always seemed to be so comfortable at Hogwarts in an environment that should have been completely out of her element, by rights. So why, in her own home, was she so frantic? She seemed to get worse the longer he stayed silent until, finally, she said, "I'm sorry, sir. They know but they don't know how bad..."

He frowned. "Miss Granger, do you mean to tell me that you have failed to inform your parents about the situation at Hogwarts and in our world?"

"Our world," she snorted. "I don't want that for my world."

Snape stared at her and, unable to help himself, forced himself to meet her gaze, to study her mind again, as he used to do from time to time, before he started getting strange ideas about her. A series of impressions, all draped in black, all sorrowing, all weary and afraid, assaulted his mind. He filed the rest away for later consideration and fell on the one he did understand immediately. "I don't want that for our world, either, Miss Granger. And that is why every one of us must do what we can. How can your parents help you if you do not give them the information they need?"

The girl frowned and looked down at her hands. "They'll be safer."

"So said Professor Dumbledore of young Mister Potter. Your fifth year, I believe."

She jerked her head up and glared at him as though struck. "They can't help and I don't want them to worry."

He turned the full intensity of his glare on her, now. "They are adults, Miss Granger," he said. She started to interrupt him, so he lifted his finger and, without thinking, brought it to within a hair's breadth of her lips. Then, with sudden shock, he realized what he was about to do and jerked his hand away. "Yes," he said shakily, "I know you are an adult, too. But your parents gave you life, they have a right to be concerned with it."

She stared at him, wide-eyed and very pale. "I... I'm afraid they'll make me leave Hogwarts."

"That is not their right, Miss Granger," he said. "You are a witch, and a powerful one when you remember it, and you are an adult yourself by every legal standard in the area. Your parents cannot make this requirement of you."

She blinked at him and looked around the room, as though expecting something unfortunate and discolored to appear from the walls. "You think I'm an adult? I'm... staggered."

"You accept responsibility for your actions and for the welfare of others. That is adult behavior." He crossed his arms over his chest, locking out her arguments as firmly as he could, but what he was really shutting out was the knowledge that adult behavior had come more slowly to him than to her in many regards. "You do not have to comply to any demands your parents may make of you, Miss Granger," he said, in the gentlest tone he could muster. "But they have already lost one child to the Death Eaters for reasons they will never understand. Don't keep them in the dark as to why the second must challenge them as well."

She gaped at him. "How did you..."

"Later," he said. "I recognized the pattern." A week ago, this conversation would have astonished him. But now, it seemed only natural that she respond to a more subtle persuasion, and that he offer it without even considering snapping at her. He stopped. "A compromise. I will assist you in whatever calming you wish done, but you must inform your parents that I am here to protect you. They can, at the very least, limit access."

She nodded. "Very well. If you tell me what happened to my sister."

"I don't know, but I can guess," he assured her.

A smiling head appeared around the corner and peered at them both from under clouds of silvery grey hair. Miss Granger was obviously in the genetic norm for this family on the interesting hair.

The Gryffindor girl grinned. "Mother, this is Professor Snape. Professor, my mother, Doctor Granger."

Snape took the woman's hand and bowed over it in the accepted form. "Madam Granger," he greeted her politely.

She smiled at him, then looked askance at Hermione. "Wizarding custom, Mum," she said. "The 'Madam' in no way detracts from 'Doctor,' it's just that British wizarding rarely has the 'Doctor' useage."

"True," agreed Snape. "The Headmaster has what, in a muggle world, would look like an entire dictionary on either end of his name, but he prefers to be simply 'Professor' Dumbledore."

"I imagine if our Hermione had gone to muggle school, she'd already be well on her way to a putting a third Doctor in the house." She turned and led them down the next hallway.

"Oh, mother," the girl protested, but was interrupted.

"No doubt," said Snape. If anyone asked him about it, he would have sworn it was very effective sarcasm.

"I thought you said he doesn't like you," her mother said, a teasing stage whisper that was clearly meant to be heard.

"He doesn't," she said, in a very embarrassed tone of voice, and fled toward the room at the end of the hall.

"I see she still has confidence problems," Dr. Granger said sadly. "At least where people are concerned. All those years around those really strong children, I thought would have had a positive impact on her."

"She's always seemed absolutely fearless to me," said Snape. He was exaggerating - he knew exactly what Madam Granger referred to and had often wondered. The Slytherin in him made him pry stealthily in even this. "I always wondered how, coming from a muggle family, she was found to be so brave upon her first sight of a magical castle."

Dr. Granger smiled at him sadly. "Hermione builds bravery from knowledge. If she knows everything about a situation, she thinks it can't hurt her. But people are beyond her control." She reached for the door, then stopped and turned to meet his eyes. "Anyone who gains her trust can have it for life, even if they abuse it from time to time. But that doesn't necessarily make her trust herself."

He nodded and opened the door, held it open for her. The dining room was a sunny yellow that somehow made it look smaller than it was. There was an antique oak table set for four, there was an ornate arrangement of flowers that looked alive but were actually not real. At the other end of the room, there was a set of French doors that opened onto what appeared to be a back terrace. The girl stood there in the arms of an older man who seemed to be talking in her ear. She was nodding and brushing at her face alternately. Snape tried very hard, but worried for her all the same.

Dinner was a quiet affair, following Snape's introduction to the girl's father, and he found it as comfortable as he had ever found any semi-formal affair. No one asked leading or prying questions, and Hermione's parents weren't particularly interested in him, anyway. They were interested in their daughter, and her place in a world they could never understand or be a part of. It was at moments like this that he believed most strongly in what Dumbledore was doing, in what Dumbledore believed. Watching the three of them together, and the depth of love they bestowed upon a daughter they might never comprehend again, he almost agreed with Miss Granger to keep them in silence.

After the dishes were cleared away and their chatter continued, as Snape sipped from his water goblet and studied them, he wondered how best to tell them. Then he heard Madam Granger use the words "Harry Potter" and realized he had run out of time to plot.

Miss Granger looked up from the table and met his eyes carefully, looking a question at him without a word. He nodded back. She sighed. "Dad, Mum, we have something very important to tell you."

Dr. Granger - Snape had been introduced to the man and promptly forgot his name - peered over his glasses at the two of them, his face positively astonished. He turned to his wife, who looked back at him and shrugged. "Very well," he said in a quiet, logical tone of voice, "we'll listen. The den, I think. Fancy a drink of something, Professor?"

"I rarely partake," said Snape, immediately, lest the temptation to relax with his relaxed surroundings overcome him.

"Me either," agreed the shorter man. "Only wine with dinner. I gave it up for Lent a few years ago and forgot to take it up again." There was an amused chuckle from the girl at his side, but Madam Granger only rolled her eyes and groaned. Snape smiled slightly, but as he had no idea what the joke meant, he wasn't sure what else to do.

The den was a large, well appointed room with yet another fireplace, and leather chairs almost exactly like the ones in Lucius Malfoy's own study. Snape suspected that these were less likely to attack someone than anything Lucius owned. The deep pile carpet and the distinctly lacking and subdued lighting of the place were very comforting to the professor as he sank into the chair next to Miss Granger's and waited calmly while her parents seated themselves, hand in hand, on the sofa facing them, Dr. Granger placing an ornate tea service on the table between them and pouring out with only a murmured question to Snape about sugar and cream.

The Head Girl's voice sounded almost exactly like it usually did in class. It made him smile to hear her drop into that annoying little lecture mode, even with her parents, and only partly because he was relieved to know that she used it on everyone. "The situation in the wizarding world is not improving. In fact, it could lead to open war any day now."

"Oh dear," said Madam Granger, "and I was hoping for some happy news. So that's why you're here, I suppose?" She directed her question to Snape.

"Yes. Miss Granger is in the most likely position to do great good for the Light, and I've been sent to protect her. She is safest back at school, of course, but Miss Granger's mad young friends convinced the Headmaster that she would be safe enough with me."

"You're not going to endanger her, though, are you?" asked Madam Granger.

Snape considered how best to reassure her, and came to a conclusion that would likely comfort everyone - himself included. "I will do everything in my power to protect your daughter from harm or death," he said, and meant it, and it became a binding oath without even the passage of another heartbeat.

Miss Granger began to speak now, carefully outlining the situation as it stood (some of it) and explaining what her parents needed to know about her position in the war. Then, in what he later learned was a gesture to ease her father's mind, she promised to see the family attorney on Tuesday after the reading of the will.

Snape sat through all this, carefully answering questions whenever they were asked, and generally waiting for her parents to lose their calm aplomb and explode. They didn't.

"Professor, if you'll excuse us for a moment?" Madam Granger said. Snape nodded and silently let himself out onto the terrace with his tea cup. It was a warm night and the stars were bright and there wasn't a cloud - or a green nightmare - in the sky. He found Orion and studied it, then followed Rigel to Sirius in Canis Major and watched the star glitter innocently away up there. He waited and tried to feel nothing, but was mercifully distracted.

Unfortunately, for one used to listening around corners and through walls, it was not easy to ignore the conversation going on behind him, mostly saddened accusations from the father, and the occasional bitter sob from Madam Granger. It came to a head with a sob from Miss Granger herself and Snape was about to turn on his heel and interrupt when the girl's mother stopped sobbing and cleared her throat.

"We love you, Hermione, and we've come to terms with the fact that you were born with this phenomenal gift that's pulled you into a different kind of life than ours. But you are never to think, even for a moment, that we do not want to know everything we can about you. You were ALWAYS our magic child, Hermione, our unlikely miracle. Your wand and your witchcraft only prove it."

The sound faded away again so he stood and counted stars a little longer, checking that he remembered something from his astronomy classes, even if only a little geography, and sipped at his now cold tea.

The sounds from inside suddenly turned to laughter. Surprised, Snape set his cup down on the little patio table and waited to see what would happen next. Miss Granger seemed to be coming toward the door.

"I'll tell you, honey," her father said, very clearly, "for a moment I honestly thought you were going to tell us you were marrying him."

Snape was very glad he had set the tea cup down.

* * *

Hermione sat up in her bed, finally having shown the Professor to the guest room just across the hall from her bedroom, and assured him that she was just a little red in the face from the heat in the house. She gave him this reassurance in a barely audible mutter because she couldn't look at him without making the reddness worse. Not to mention that she was still convinced that Snape could still read her mind - Merlin only knew what he'd see in there this time. She promised to meet him for breakfast at seven in the morning - she had to set the alarm clock for him and told him just to use a silencing charm on it until she could come turn it off.

She was trying to convince herself that she was reading from the Encyclopedia Esoterica, again, when her mother let herself into the room and settled down on the bed next to her. "Are you okay, baby?" the older woman asked. Hermione looked up from her book and really looked at her mother. Coming home almost always made her aware of the age differences between them, even more so this time, as Hermione came back worried.

"I..." Hermione stopped and sighed. She had done enough lying. "I hope you and Dad know I was only trying to take care of you."

Her mother snorted. "You can take care of me when I'm old, Hermione. I'm in perfect health, as is your father. We may be muggles, but we take good care of ourselves."

"Yes," she said, and sighed. "I'm a very arrogant little witch, aren't I?"

"You come by that honestly," her mother said, then smirked. "Your father thinks he knows everything, too."

Hermione laughed at the old joke. Her mother was actually the one who had the similar personality - well, she did have her father's Don Quixote love of a cause, but it was her mother's studious arrogance that had formed the basis of her character and everyone knew that.

"I just want you to know that you can tell me anything you want to at anytime. I will always listen and I will try my very best to understand."

Hermione nodded and her mother got up. Just before the older woman left, Hermione turned to the door and stopped her. "Anything?" she said.

Her mother nodded. Hermione picked up her wand off the various tables and cast a silencing charm on them, followed by an imperturbable charm on the door, just to be sure. Her mother raised an eyebrow, then rejoined her daughter on the bed again.

"Mum, I don't really know how to say this." Hermione sighed, stared at her hands, then looked up and met her mother's eyes proudly. "I'm in love."

_

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Hermione's much older sister, Gertrude, is the property of whydoyouneedtoknow, who writes the "Living with Danger" series, and is used by permission.(She can be found on - check my favorites lists)__Iam impressed by the stories, so the slipping in of the main character is my way of honoring that interesting world._


	15. Chapter 15: The Moon Rows Away

**I'm very excited that everyone is still following along. I plan to have this finished before the Big Day so watch for rapid updates starting Monday. Don't forget to review, of course, sometimes great things happen when you review! ****

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Touch the Air Softly

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**

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Chapter 15: The Moon Rows Away**

When the girl knocked at his door the next morning, he was still trying to transfigure the strange muggle appliance back into what it had been when it woke him with its benighted, infernal beeping. The sound had shattered a rather unpleasant dream and had seemed so much a part of it that the spell just jumped from his lips.

"It is absolutely a wonder to me that muggles are even sane," grumbled Snape, letting her into the room, "especially if they must wake up to this every morning."

She looked at the small plastic box turtle squatting dejectedly on the television, her face a perfect picture of surprise. "Ron blew his up last time he visited - he tried to stun it, I think." She pulled out her wand and transfigured the turtle into a statue of a turtle. "Best I could do," she apologized, picking up the little statue and pocketing it. "Muggle technology doesn't do well after it's been enchanted."

"Of course," said Snape. He sat down on the window seat that looked out over the front of the house and gestured vaguely at the bed with his wand, satisfied that it made itself up without arguing. The girl was smiling at him whimsically when he looked up from putting on his boots. "Is there something on your mind, Miss Granger?" he asked, surprised that he had managed it without even a trace of his usual snide. It was rather too early in the morning to ask anyone to be pleasant in his opinion, and certainly not someone who was quite comfortable with a perpetually bad attitude.

She blinked, surprised. "Ah, sorry sir, no. I mean, yes. I mean... bother." She stared at her feet.

The image rose unbidden in his mind, assaulting his senses with its realism, an image of rising and drawing her to him, holding her tight, whispering in her pink shell ear, "There's something on my mind as well. Shall we discuss it?" It was his own voice he heard in his head, but huskier. Snape shook his head but the image wouldn't clear. It was stronger than ever any of his ideas of her had been. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and looked deeply into his eyes, hers soft and innocent gazing back at him. He leaned toward her and watched a precious desire bloom in the rich brown depths. His hand moved of its own accord to touch her face...

There was a clatter, the sound of his wand hitting the floor. He blinked rapidly and forced himself not to breathe hard or gasp. It was like coming up from a dive. The room swam briefly. Miss Granger seemed lost in a small daze, so she hadn't noticed his moment of weakness. He cleared his throat and she jumped.

"I'm sorry sir," she said, her voice a little high and a little breathless. "Breakfast is waiting for us, if you're hungry."

He fought off an entire series of hallucinatory suggestions for responses to that statement, and rose briskly with only a nod. A quick search around the tile work near the window seat returned his wand to his custody, so he followed the Gryffindor girl, desperately searching his mind for an explanation of this... this... disease he had acquired. He was the pureblood head of Slytherin House, a Potions Master, a defected Death Eater, a traitor, a spy. She was a know-it-all muggleborn Gryffindor with unsavory friends. And she was only eighteen, not a child, but didn't a person have to be a pervert to put aside that kind of age difference? He was almost 40 and all hope he had ever had for happiness had ended... he paused with surprise, though his feet went where they needed to, and realized that he had actually never before thought of that at all. Had he ever been happy?

They arrived in a completely different room from last night, a room with a large bay window that looked out onto yet another section of grounds. There was a single table set for two right in front of the window. "Miss Granger," he said, having found his voice at last, for something safely mundane, "precisely how large is this house?"

"Rather ostentatious, isn't it? It belonged to the family several generations back, we think. Dad inherited it and we moved here when I was very small. They've been restoring it for years - Dad says it's a money pit."

Snape held her chair for her, and smiled to himself at the look of bald shock she wore as she sat down. "I have always imagined many of these old manors to be rather like that. I divested myself of one the moment it came into my possession for precisely that reason."

She smiled encouragingly and gestured him to the breakfast that had been laid out for them. He checked the tea and poured out, preparing her cup from memory of what her father had given her last night. This did not seem to surprise her at all. "How did you end up with a manor?"

"The same way any pure-blood son did in those days." He sighed and spooned eggs on to his plate, then helped himself to a few sausages.

"Oh," she said quietly. She nibbled at her toast and jam and poured herself a glass of orange juice. He didn't mean to watch her, but caught himself spreading butter on his bread after it was already completely covered, watching her nervously watch her hands.

"What is your itinerary for the day, Miss Granger?"

"I need to buy a new dress, so I need to do that this morning. The funeral is this evening, and there'll be people here all day tomorrow, so I'm going to need proper clothes."

"You woke me with some defective muggle contraption in order to buy yourself a new dress? Transfigure something, woman, you're a witch!" This would have sounded more in character, if he hadn't marred the whole effect by immediately smiling at her.

She grinned cheekily back at him, an expression that almost snatched his breath away. "I woke you up, and now I'm dragging you out shopping! Your day's just getting better and better, Professor."

* * *

The worst thing about shopping with Severus Snape, Hermione thought, was that she was already confused enough before they started the trip. She drove them to the nearest shopping center after breakfast. (Hermione was only slightly more comfortable behind the wheel than on a broomstick, but she didn't explain that before they left.)

Snape insisted on following her everywhere she went, though she thought he would have been more comfortable ignoring her, perhaps in the doorway with a book. "I'm so totally out of character," she told him, rummaging through a rack of rather interesting black dresses. "I only own my school uniform in black."

He actually smiled at this. "Basic black can suit anyone."

"You would know," she agreed merrily, eyeing his black trousers and black polo shirt critically. There was a tiny, vividly green snake where the horse should have been, but otherwise the emulation was perfect.

It was another ten minutes before she completely lost it. "What do you think?" she asked him, holding a rather sedate dress against her to look at and then looking up in horrified realization of whom she was talking to. "Oops," she said.

"Shouldn't you choose something more in keeping with your age?" was all he said, glaring at the dress with a critical distaste. He looked up at her and rolled his eyes. "Choose something, please, Miss Granger," he added, and it almost sounded forced, as though he was trying to convince her that he was irritated, rather than genuinely being irritated.

She went through three more racks before he did get truly annoyed. He looked at the rack, scanned the items with a critical eye, and finally pulled off a dress that she had ignored before because of the skirt. "Put this on," he said, grimly.

"But... the... Yes, sir." She sighed and went to the changing rooms, and shook her head as he checked inside, and then ushered her in.

She felt somewhat embarrassed but found that the dress did look nice, and so what if it was a little short in the skirt, it was also very professional. It wasn't like Snape would be looking at her legs... no matter how much she might want him to do. When she stepped out, she was absolutely floored to find him waiting for her again, with something else, this time a dress, a small peasant-top like affair with a long, flaring skirt. "This is more appropriate to a young witch, even a muggleborn one," he said. "You should not select clothing that you can share with Professors McGonagall and Vector."

Some naughty little demon must have whispered in her ear because she batted her eyes and moved close to him, affecting a simpering smile. "Why, professor," she said sweetly, before she could stop herself, "I didn't know you cared!" She even giggled. Hermione Granger giggled.

Snape turned his best poison glare on her, the one that could put a hippogriff off its lunch. She snatched the dress and ran into the changing room, unable to figure out what had come over her and wondering if it would be safe to come out soon - or ever.

The professor made it much easier for her. Faintly, but for the first time in her life, she heard a sound rather like disused machinery. Hogwarts just might fall in on itself - Severus Snape was laughing.

* * *

Snape thought he was doing fine through lunch - some disreputable muggle concoction of dough and sauce and cheese, surprisingly edible for all that it looked thoroughly defective.

He managed to eat it without wearing any of it. Miss Granger was not so lucky, and when they returned to her parents' home, she dashed upstairs with her bags, holding the front of her ruined blouse away from her body. It wasn't his fault, he maintained that firmly, and he would not be responsible, even though the slippery coverings had slid off the dough as she was holding it at an awkward angle, gaping at him as he told her a joke he had heard at the last Order meeting.

He seated himself in the dining room with the London Times and the rest of his drink from their lunch and wondered what else could go wrong. He was behaving very strangely around her, and he knew it, but he couldn't find any way or reason to stop it. Just as she had teased him on what was so obviously a mad impulse, so he found himself unwilling to stop the course of gradually losing the formality between them. He didn't dare entertain the hope of what he had realized while watching her sleep - had it only been two nights ago? But he couldn't stop himself, at least a little, from daring to try for something - a little kindness between them, perhaps, a friendship.

Yes, that could be a blessing enough to change his world at least a little. There was war on and sorrow everywhere, and viciousness enough in both their lives that they didn't need to waste their anger on each other. These had been his late lessons of the past two years, and the girl's presence in his life was starting to bring it all into sharp retort.

He went back to his paper, comforted.

Fifteen minutes later, Miss Granger had not returned, but her mother had been through the room six times, speaking politely each time. He noted on her third trip that Madam Granger had become decidedly more distraught than the last two trips. By her sixth trip, the poor woman rather resembled McGonagall the day the first years' letters went out, only without the mad tendency to transfigure things into small objects and tread on them.

He stopped her politely when she greeted him. "Is there something wrong, Madam Granger?" he asked.

The girl appeared in the doorway at that very moment, bearing what seemed to be a welcome tea tray. He took the tray and situated it on the table, giving the girl time to calm her mother and get the older woman situated in a chair.

When they were all in possession of the proper cups of a nice Darjeeling, Madame Granger finally confessed the problem.

"Nancy was going to sing, of course, but she came down with laryngitis, I tried Margie next, but she and Ted are on vacation for the next six months. Six months - who has that kind of money! The Conners have a new baby and Andrew isn't up to it yet. Of course Edith volunteered, but I'd rather be run over by a truck than listen to that woman squawk, and I know Aunt Gretchen absolutely despised her AND her singing voice."

As the woman continued, Snape wondered idly where they kept the fire whiskey in this house - the woman desperately needed some in her tea. He found an unfamiliar sensation of deep sympathy and fought it as hard as he could. However, as the panic in the mother's face transferred to the daughter, he found himself defenseless.

"I can help," he heard a voice say, and hated it, because it was his own. "I know _Bist Du Bie Mir_. Will that suffice?"

He heard a crash, then the quiet, consecutive murmurs of "_reparo_" and "_evanesco_". He looked at Miss Granger and she grimaced at him, sheepishly. "You'll never cease to amaze me, Professor," she said quietly. "Another custom among the Pure-blood sons?"

"Look my mother up in your _Wizards in the Arts_ book when you get back to Hogwarts," he suggested.

She nodded. "I will, thank you."

The expression Madame Granger wore conveyed a profound sense of relief. "Hermione, if you can play that hymn she always had you play - whatever it was - I think those two pieces will be perfect."

"Erm... I haven't touched my violin since last summer."

"Then you'd best go practice," her mother said.

The Gryffindor nodded, set down her neatly repaired cup, and flounced upstairs. "Is there a music room in this house?"

"Hermione's practice room is upstairs - she did something to it last summer so we don't hear her?"

"Silencing charm," he said.

"Yes, that's what she said. And the music room is three doors that way and on the other side of the hall.

He nodded gratefully and left her calmly sorting decorations she pulled from the huge china hutch.

* * *

Hermione would never remember most of what happened at the funeral. She stood and played that old folk hymn on her violin, cheerfully bemused that it actually sounded as perfect as it ever had. Of course, she brought the better of her two instruments, the one Aunt Gretchen had bought her when she was seven. She was rather pleased that the little old women sitting on the row with her parents nodded and smiled as she played.

Some time later, as her thoughts had stopped wandering around death and the purpose of a life, she realized that the Professor had just risen to sing. She didn't know what to expect - his speaking voice had always been a thing of elegant sophistry so she imagined his singing voice would probably be quite nice.

What she wasn't prepared for was how incredible that sound really was. It was a clear, rich baritone, the sound that a cello made, really, with hardly any of the customary vibrato of a classically trained musician. Rather, it was an innocent sound, dark but somehow made safe and gentle, like a winter night before a warm fire. It stole her away from her body in a way that nothing else ever had - it turned her mind off and sent her hurtling into a world that was all moonbeams and music on water. She knew she might have heard more lovely sounds in her lifetime, but none of them was pure, distilled magic.

She would never forget this for the rest of her life. Her imagination had given her only a cool shadow of the truth and now that she had it, she wanted it forever.

It was only when she looked up, and her father was handing her a little pamphlet with the German actually translated, that she realized he was watching her. "Be thou with me and I'll gladly go/To death and to my repose..." she read.

Snape came and sat beside her, and she leaned over him to whisper, "Thank you, Professor," in his ear. She was just imagining, she was sure, that he trembled.

After the service, all sorts of people came up to them and said something about her song, about Snape's, a heartfelt sympathy to her parents. "We'll have to play together, some time," said a warm, friendly voice Hermione hadn't heard in quite a while.

"Professor Lupin," she said, happily, turning to shake his hand. "I didn't know you played," she added.

"I didn't know you did - we could have done something together, sooner. Severus has always had a lovely singing voice, though."

"No doubt," she agreed fervently. The way he was studying her face made her feel somewhat nervous - Harry had suggested once that Lupin read minds as well as Snape did. "Are you a friend of the family?" she asked.

"My mother was a friend of Gretchen's - a muggle, as you may know."

"Oh, of course. Then I must introduce you to my parents."

"In a moment," he said and carefully drew her aside and out of immediate earshot of anyone. "I was wondering why Severus didn't take his eyes off of you the whole time he was singing. Now I know. How long?"

Hermione crinkled her face up and frowned at him, genuinely confused. "How long what?"

"How long have you been with him?"

"Never, or a few minutes less, why?" She glared at him as sternly as she could.

Lupin chuckled. "He's already rubbing off on you, I see." Abruptly, he sobered and looked her firmly in the eye. "Be careful, Hermione. And let me know if there's anything I can do for you. You were a good friend to me and I owe you at least one favor, probably more."

She nodded this time, generally relieved and, on impulse, hugged the werewolf like she would her father. He pulled away and, five seconds later, started sneezing uncontrollably.

This went on until Lupin managed to blow his nose and catch a deep breath. All the while, Snape was standing there, smugly, one hand inside his coat. "Hello, Lupin," he said politely enough. Aside to Hermione while Lupin accepted a cup of water from the funeral director, he added, "Werewolves are notoriously allergic to powered aconite leaves. No one else is, though."

She smiled up at him, feeling her lips curl in a manner similar to his own. "And you just did it for the verification, of course."

He grinned cheekily at her. "Of course."

Professor Lupin smiled at both of them. "Thank you for the charming gift, Severus," he said in his most polite (and for Lupin that was something amazing) tone of voice.

Hermione led him off to meet her parents and greeted a hundred other guests who came to pay their respects to the kindly old woman and her family. But all that day, and into the long night (where she fell exhausted into her bed two minutes after getting to her room, but did not manage to sleep for hours), she could not get Lupin's words out of her mind. Had Snape really been watching her? She couldn't help herself, even when sleep finally claimed her, from hoping against hope that he had been.


	16. Chapter 16: The Earth is Ablaze

This chapter has been cut short by a handful of bad facts, so anyone who wanted lemonade with this chapter will have to bring their own lemons. Sorry.

Also, about _Bist Du Bei Mir_ – it's a song traditionally credited to Bach that is something of a dark dirge but, because of the interesting pledge of its lyrics, it is performed at both weddings and funerals. The voice that is required is either a lyric soprano/tenor or a spectral voice that is kept in blackest despair – hence, Snape. Still, I hope the explanation you see below is less unsatisfactory than this, **Julian**, as I suspect this may be a matter of opinion. I agree with you that he will never be caught dead singing _If You're Snarky and You Know It_, but I have always maintained that you will never expect where the most majestic sound comes from – ask Stormy.

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Touch the Air Softly**

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 16: Earth is Ablaze**

The moment her eyes opened on Sunday, Hermione was desperate to reach the new books in her father's library. She was planning to spend as much of the day as she possibly could holed up alone with the books, pretending that the world outside the house wasn't ablaze and the world inside it didn't include the mad man she was recklessly in love with.

So, she did not receive his presence in her haven with great grace. However, he refused to even acknowledge her existence when she entered the room, but rather sat in a dark recliner in the darkest corner of the room and read from a very old and very dark looking book on his lap. The whole image bothered her, but she couldn't think why for a few minutes.

She had turned the corner and moved three shelves away before it dawned on her what was wrong. Growing up with Ron and Harry, she had gradually grown able to tell just by looking at them when they were trying to get her to believe something. It bothered her for one thing that Snape was now doing the same thing and for another that she was beginning to know him well enough to realize this. It wasn't an easy talent with her - Harry and Ron had lied to her with impunity until they were sixteen and she'd finally realized they were doing it. "Your book's upside down, Professor," she called.

"Thank you, Miss Granger," came the dust dry reply, "I'd wondered what was wrong with it."

She bit back the cheery "You're welcome," before it could leave her lips.

Ten minutes later, Snape came around the corner and found Hermione lounging in the floor on a large cushion, reading from one book and surrounded by various others. "I'd wondered why you had become so quiet," he said, "but I see this section of the library has exploded on you."

Hermione smiled and held up the text she was reading. He glanced over it quickly and snorted. "If that man was plotting, he was more a fool at it than Peter Pettigrew."

"He's never been called a fool," she replied, amused. "Perhaps he had great plans but ran out of time. More a Fudge than a Pettigrew?" She turned the page calmly.

Snape snorted again and looked at the picture taking up the right hand side of this book. "Now his successor - there was a man for a Dark Lord to envy."

"Twisted?" she asked.

"Completely bent," Snape said. "Here, I'll show you." And, sitting down next to her, he pulled out another history from that same time frame and flipped rapidly through the pages.

"I never would have picked you for a singer," she informed him while he looked.

"No one ever does," he assured her. "But if it annoyed my father, my mother was all for it." He dropped the book on the cushion before her, and pointed out a passage to serve as his example. "Bent. Like a corkscrew."

They spent the morning lost in old England. By the end of an hour, they were interrupting each other to make points and by the end of five, they were arguing heatedly in the middle of the floor over the complexities of matching magical government to muggle.

Hermione's mother came in and picked up the sandwich tray from lunch and shook her head at them both. "Libraries are traditionally quiet," she said, as though merely stating a fact. "Hermione, he'll know a bit more about it than you, simply from having lived it. Professor, you'll find that her fresh perspective will be of great benefit to those who'll accept it. And both of you have an hour to change for dinner. I suggest you call the game - or at least a recess." She turned and left, closing the door firmly behind her.

Hermione blinked at the professor and took a few deep breaths. He held up his hands in a gesture that could be misinterpreted as surrender by someone who did not know him well.

"I can't think what came over me..." she started.

"Miss Granger, do shut up," he interrupted. Then hesmiled at her. "It was positively invigorating. I'll escort you to dinner in an hour." Then, he turned and left her standing there gaping.

* * *

Much later in the evening, Hermione cornered him with the question she had forgotten. He had abandoned the dinner and conversation as soon as he seemed to feel he could, but Hermione had watched him go through several glasses of wine and, when he hadn't reappeared, she decided to bring the bottle and get some answers.

She found him in the lounge with the old portrait of her family. Gertrude was a haunting figure in the fire light in these pictures, the only ones of her that would ever exist. Snape was looking at her in a way that seemed both sad and angry and Hermione was desperate to know what was on his mind. She poured him another glass of wine and one for herself, and walked over to him where he watched the portrait.

He accepted the glass and sipped at it for some moments before he finally said, "You were a charming child, Miss Granger, whatever happened?"

She laughed. "You did," she said, then quickly, "I mean you as in magical... I mean..."

"For a woman who reads everything she can lay hands to, you have trouble with words sometimes, Miss Granger." He smiled. "I was thinking how long it had been since the last time I imbibed anything alcoholic."

"End of my fourth year? That's the last time I slept peacefully."

He nodded. "I didn't plan on drinking anything tonight, but it's a very fine vintage, it seemed a shame..." he sighed. "Never mind."

She smiled. "Professor, why were you reading upside down this morning?"

"Oh, that," he said. He paused, looking up at the portrait again, taking a long drink of the wine. "I have made you a promise about this. I do not have to like it."

Hermione quickly swallowed the wine in her mouth, lest she choke. "Professor, anything you can tell me..."

"I know. I just want you to understand that this is old information. There is nothing that can be changed with it now."

She nodded and, with exaggerated care, sipped at her glass. Snape frowned and, finally escorted her over to the chair at her father's desk and made her sit down.

"Your sister obviously died from the killing curse. What you must understand is that the person who killed her is mad and mad people leave their traces. This particular person leaves an inadvertent signature, which I will not be specific about. Nevertheless, it was very clearly present, indeed was mentioned in the article here."

"But who did it, Professor? I have to know!"

"I don't think she suffered," he said hesitantly. Hermione would never have believed it of him if she hadn't actually heard it.

"Who killed her?" she demanded again.

"Bellatrix LeStrange."

Hermione gaped at him. Bellatrix LeStrange. Her brain shorted out briefly and she was standing in the closed ward at St. Mungo's with Neville and watching the painfully ill Alice Longbottom wander distractedly toward them, offering a candy wrapper in good humor as she didn't know anything else. "Didn't suffer?"

Before she knew what had happened, she had taken off at a dead run.

* * *

How much time had passed, she didn't know, but she did know that she'd grown cold enough to conjure a blanket and her cloak from her room in one of her briefly lucid moments. She had been crying and shaking almost non-stop since she heard the horrible words from Professor Snape. How was it possible that he could believe that a woman who tortured people into madness for fun had somehow simply killed her sister?

"I wish I could kill her," whispered Hermione. She thought she was alone, and she didn't realize she had spoken aloud. But there were more shocks than just hearing the sound of a voice like burning velvet speaking to her from the shadows. What was blinding and staggering was what he said - and that he of all people said it.

"It won't help."

Hermione looked over across the garden at the shadows of the house, and could just make out his alabaster face against the blackness of his clothes and the darkness. "Excuse me?" she said, to avoid the acid comment that she was tempted to fling at him.

"It won't help." He held up a hand and succeeded in stemming her impending flood of crackling vituperation, but only just. "Several of your classmates share your sentiment, Miss Granger, and doubtlessly, one of you will succeed. But it will not help."

That did it. "Who are you to tell me that vengeance is unacceptable?" He, who probably held a wizarding world record in a life wasted for the sake of revenge, looked her unflinching in the eye and, astonishingly, smiled.

"I do not say that your feeling is misplaced, Miss Granger. But it will not help you in the end to take her life from her, or to watch others take it. Merlin knows Bellatrix LeStrange is long past due - hers is a life upon which every gift has been bestowed, and wasted, too, and what she takes from others surely has already over-balanced her accounts to justifiably send her tipping into any death or hell in which she may find herself. But her death will not take away your sorrow for your sister, nor will it sate your desire to live the life that could have been instead of the one that is."

"You sound like Dumbledore," she said, calm because she felt that every ounce of the pain had been wrung out of her. "How wise." Her body ached with screaming numbness.

"Wisdom comes hard to some of us, but it comes eventually."

She smiled, more at the thoughts this evoked than at him. "I'm the one who set your cloak on fire in first year." She didn't know where that had come from - it was as if some one else was speaking the words, merely borrowing her to get them out.

"I had ascertained as much. That bluebell flame was a particular specialty of yours. Well, I can't say your taste in pets has greatly improved, but your kneazle seems somewhat less dangerous."

She shook her head. Of course he knew, how could she have been so foolish. "I stole from you in second year."

"As did Mr. Fawcett, Miss Dawlish, the Weasley Twins, and Mr. Malfoy. At the time I thought it was Potter. I wanted it to be Potter. But as long as someone did it, it was not unwelcome."

"Did what?" she asked. Was he saying what she thought...

"Used the Polyjuice Potion in an attempt to locate the Heir of Slytherin. Do you think I routinely mention Restricted Section materials to second-year lessons? I mentioned it to every class. Only your trio and the Weasley boys successfully took the bait. Well, and Malfoy might have done, but he'd never confess it."

"How very Slytherin of you," she said, genuinely admiring him.

"And so Gryffindor to admit it, even if it took you years. Your potion went wrong with the additive, not the potion itself - I presume now to state that you brewed it?"

"Yes, well, with Ron's help in the stirring instructions, of course."

"Of course." There was a sound of movement. She would guess he had decided to sit in one of the patio chairs. "Ten points to Gryffindor."

She shook her head. "I really can't think of... oh yes, I suppose I should apologize for stunning you in third year."

"No, you shouldn't," he replied. He was silent for some moments. "That brings me back to where this conversation started," he finally added, the words sounding almost as though they had been dragged out of him.

"Where?"

"Revenge." His pronunciation managed to make the word into something filthy, not to be used in polite company, and certainly not to a young woman.

She stood up and shook out her blanket, then laid it down on the ground, gesturing toward it once she had seated herself. She heard him rise and move toward her, but he was still watching her from the darkness. She was almost afraid for him to come out, as though the darkness was all that held the spell of these last two days in place and that, were he to come and sit with her, he would return to the angry Potions professor with the bad attitude and the worse mouth.

"If you children hadn't stunned me, I would have willingly committed a terrible wrong, purely in the name of revenge."

"I thought you hated him."

"I did. I didn't always, but by then, I did. But that night, I would have killed all of you simply to insure I got him, and that is when vengeance is well beyond madness."

"What do you mean you didn't always?"

Now, he began to pace. She could make out the shape of his cloak, billowing behind him, and wondered if he took comfort in melodramatic gestures. "We grew up together, Potter and the Blacks and I. Well, that's what the old Pureblood families do. They make their children 'friends' at young ages and teach the lot that no one but these children is acceptable to be with. Well, the Blacks and my parents did. The Potters were not like that, but none of the Pureblood parents realized it until the year we were all to go off to Hogwarts. Then, Black and I were not allowed to speak to Potter anymore.

"When we got on the Hogwarts Express, it had been a year since either of us had seen Potter, but Black went off with him as if nothing had ever happened, as if Potter wasn't from a shameful, blood-traitor house, as if nothing our parents had told us both meant anything to him. At the feast that night, he got himself sorted into Gryffindor, and then so did Potter." He paused, then sat down. "I've never told anyone this story," he confessed slowly, and tried to sort himself into a comfortable position. "The Sorting Hat offered me a place in Gryffindor, but I was too furious with my former 'friends' to even consider it. I wanted to be as far from them as possible. Plus, I wanted to have a home to go to, and getting into Gryffindor wouldn't be conducive to that.

"There were times when we almost made up, over the years. They would prank me, I would prank them, we'd end up in detention together, and we'd almost make it back to treating each other like human beings."

"But what happened, then?" she dared. "Because I saw you that night, sir. You'd have cheerfully ripped his throat out."

"With my teeth," he agreed grimly. "This may as well be the night for confessions." He meticulously adjusted his cloak and placed his hands carefully on one knee, as though choosing his confession pose very carefully. "Fifth year went very badly. We did things to each other that I wouldn't wish on my enemies, now, things that we shouldn't have gotten away with, things that were hurtful, and cruel, and permanent, or at least permanently life-changing. I can't tell you what they were - but the last one they pulled on me that year sent me to see people I shouldn't have done, and earned me an ill-behaved tattoo and the perpetual enmity of a nice young woman who had never done me any harm. I have never since that day used that expression if there was anything else I could say instead."

Hermione frowned. "I'm sorry, sir. I didn't know you'd gotten involved so young."

"What, Potter didn't tell you about this?"

She shook her head. "Harry's not like that, sir. I assume he found out in Occlumency?"

"You could say that," Snape agreed. She could see the expression on his face, filled with anger and self-loathing.

"How did you come to Dumbledore, sir? If you don't mind my asking?"

He looked off into the distance, his expression still one of disgust, but it was a distant disgust, for the actions of a boy long gone. "Revenge, again," he said, bitterly. "Some fools never learn." He frowned. "This is a very hard tale, I have no idea why I am telling you any of this - the wine, I suppose." He held up the bottle and a pair of glasses.

"Probably," she agreed and, accepting the bottle, poured for both of them.

He took it and sipped at it then, in a night soft voice filled with recrimination, he began to speak. "I had no desire to wear the Dark Mark, nor did I want to spend my life beholden to anyone who treated the people around him so poorly. All I wanted was to kill those two and get back to my life. Unfortunately, there was no going back. We realized that quite early, and most of us had the sense not to try it. This was my sixth year at Hogwarts and I had already decided that I had completely destroyed whatever potential my life might have held."

"There's no need to open old wounds," she said quietly.

"They're not old when you keep them open all the time. This is what such desperation can do to you."

Before she even realized what she was doing, she put her golden hand on his pale one to comfort him. He was cold, and didn't seem to need her touch, but he didn't flinch away from her and therefore, she didn't care. "I'm so sorry," she said.

He turned toward her on the blanket, but did not release her hand. "I was hoping, somehow, that every single horror that happened would die with him, but it didn't. Everything that happens there is recorded and I thought – I hoped...I watched the footage to see the end of it, and I hoped against hope that all the pain would be carried away with him, but he slipped behind that Veil completely at peace, and left me with every single drop of anger and hatred I had ever had for him, for all of them." He frowned. "My so-called revenge will always be denied me, Miss Granger, and you would do well not to get caught up in such a life. It is bitter and it will age you before your time. You will never know a moment's peace and, in the end, the final catharsis will be forever beyond your personal reach."

She sighed and, against her better judgment, squeezed his hand. "There are other forms of peace," she said.

They sat out there until the guests left the house and, when the grass was damp around them, rose to go indoors. "Professor," she said quietly and stopped him under the porch light, "can we be friends?"

His expression was open and impish and at the same time somewhat frightened. "Your companions won't approve."

"That's their problem, isn't it?" She felt her face curl into a somewhat mischievous smile of her own.

"After this day, Miss Granger, I suspect we rather are."

"Hermione," she corrected.

"Hermione," he repeated.

* * *

Please review, and look for Chapter 17 tomorrow. 


	17. Chapter 17: Oceans Aglow

_**Julian – **thanks for the tale of your misadventures – it was so fun and so nice of you to share. I appreciate the information on upright/uptight British males and hope my interpretation didn't put you off too much. I can't imagine a world with magic but no music, or a voice like that without a song. I'll be more careful next time._

_To everyone else who reviewed – thank you so much for the good opinions and the insightful comments. I hope you like this latest chapter. If all goes well, expect two tomorrow._

_If for some reason, you are at all sensitive to certain types of imagery, you may want to skip to the first scene break._

**

* * *

Touch the Air Softly**

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 17: Oceans Aglow **

Two lovers met in the darkness. He as pale as the moon, she as golden as the sun, they came together for reasons that neither would be able to explain for all the rest of their lives, though if anyone could have witnessed this magical interlude, the pronunciation that the first reason was love would have come unbidden.

So long hidden in the passing night, his hands were cold against her skin, in that welcome way that ice feels to a fever, a cold so deep it burns as he touched her face, her skin. His icy lips turned her skin to molten gold as he bent his head to kiss her throat.

A soft, wild sound escaped her lips, and she tilted her head down to him, their lips meeting with a desperate hunger. The cataclysm as the elemental forces that made them collided sent shockwaves of desire pouring over each of them - over them, around them, through them. They merged their bodies without hesitation, an ornamental grace of cream and gold entwined hips to hip, thigh to thigh, golden arms curling through night black hair, pale, thin lips at rosy, golden flesh.

Her body bloomed to his lightest touch, his own becoming the instrument that responded only to her elegant hands. The very air was on fire, fuelled by the flame of her young passion and stoked by the fan of his old longing. Their breath came in sharp, quick gasps, and murmured words of encouragement. They communicated their needs to each other in soft exclamations of pleasure and surprise. He whispered against her throat the promises of knowledge; she cried against his lips the thrill of new-flown innocence. Their eyes, when they met, telegraphed messages more emotional, the feeling of completeness and finding a place to belong. His were blacker than the night, and deep and burning. Hers were brown swirled with blue, growing bluer as the moments drew them closer. Her body wrapped around his, enfolded him, enclosed him, and he moved with her to draw them both to a paradise either unknown or forgotten.

Time was endless and meant nothing between them, and for that passage of endless nothing, there was everything between them that could ever be. They breathed together, as one, and then, as though the sound was ripped from his body, her name escaped his lips.

* * *

The tapping at the window was as unwelcome as a Death Eater on Privet Drive. Snape pulled his pillow over his head to ignore it. It continued, insistently, to tap. He groaned and turned over and tried desperately to get back to his dream. The wretched owl found a weak place in the window casing and began to tap there, causing the window to thud and rattle in its frame.

A normal night would have found him out of bed at the faintest hint of something unusual. But a normal night would not have had him rising groggily from an empty bed, bemused, bewildered, and lonely, reflecting bitterly upon the noted emptiness.

He flung open the window and found, to his shock, one of Dumbledore's school owls bearing a message. _"It is imperative,"_ Dumbledore's loopy handwriting proclaimed, _"that you return following the meetings today."_

Snape looked at the note, then at the agitated barn owl. "When have you ever known me to possess owl treats?" he asked calmly. The white faced creature continued to glare at him with jewel bright eyes, so he finally dragged his cloak down from behind the door and slipped the stubborn thing a bit of owl treat from an inside pocket. "And don't tell anyone I gave you that," he added as it flitted out the still open window.

A few moments of worrying and checking the hideous mark on his arm passed before he could even decide what action to take. He looked out the window and admired the slow rising sun.

A few flicks of his wand and everything he had brought with him was packed. So was the muggle photograph of Hermione he had stolen from the library last night. He satisfied himself that everything was reasonable and reached for the door to go knock on Miss Granger's door to wake her with the unpleasant news.

* * *

The little rapping noise at the window had a distinctive rhythm to it, but Hermione wasn't even interested enough in Harry's issues at the moment to be willing to open her eyes. She had been somewhere else a moment ago, somewhere blissful and intoxicating, and she was utterly uninterested in being here in her little princess bed with Hedwig tapping at her window.

Hedwig, of course, couldn't be dissuaded by other people's problems when she had a goal, as anyone who had got between the snowy owl and her pet Harry over the years could attest. Hermione managed three turns and got balled up in the covers pretty well, but that didn't stop Hedwig at all, and she ended up hopping over to the window with the bedspread tangled around her feet.

_"Hermione,"_ the missive read, _"you have to come back as soon as you can. Something's up, and I don't know what, but Ron thinks you need to be here. Professor Dumbledore is writing Snape - hope he wasn't too hard on you - and I decided to send Hedwig to let you know, too, so Snape can't wrong-foot you. As soon as your meeting's over, Snape's supposed to have something he can do, Dumbledore said. We'll see you this evening. Love from, Harry."_

Hermione sighed and fought her way out of the comforter. Hedwig hopped in through the window and went over to Hermione's desk, where Crookshanks' food was kept during the summers - Hedwig would usually help herself, much to the cat's annoyance. "He's not here right now, girl. You'll have to go with me downstairs. Can you wait?"

The elegant snowy owl blinked at her with those wise, intelligent eyes and bobbed her head in what might very well have been a nod.

Hermione flung herself into the shower and muttered and fussed as the heated spray rushed over her body, washing away her dream from her memory. By the time she finished washing her hair, all she remembered was that she had never had a more sensual dream in her entire life. Even that thought was enough to terrify and exhilarate her as she flicked her wand around the room and tackled all of her muggle chores at once.

Turning to the mirror, she checked her appearance and smiled. Her eyes looked a bit odd in the desk lamp only light, but they seemed to be a very pretty color so she didn't argue. She did pull her hair up and put a half-dozen pins in it to get it to stay in a bun, remembering as she did the snide comments she and Snape had tossed back and forth at each other when this trip first started.

Worry kept her from enjoying the few moments of peace and quiet that she felt she ought to be taking to enjoy her forbidden love and how it was at least no longer so hideously unthinkable - at least she could speak to him without being treated so breath-takingly rudely. Instead, she flung the last of her personal items into her bag, grabbed her tablet and pen and headed across the hall to see if Snape's missive had arrived yet. Hedwig flitted over and landed on her shoulder, bobbing gracefully as she walked.

She stepped lightly into the corridor and had her hand up to knock on the door when it opened and he was standing there, obviously in the process of leaving. "Oh," she exclaimed sharply, and for some reason felt her eyes lock with his. Hedwig ghosted away downstairs, leaving them standing in the corridor, blinking at each other in hazy, early morning confusion. The dream images from last night raced back into her head, colliding with the image of the uncomfortable looking man in front of her. His cheeks appeared to be faintly rouged, probably from the exertion of packing all his things so quickly.

He moved sharply and caught her case from her hand before she could drop it. "Are you quite well, Miss Granger?"

"Hermione," she corrected.

"Are you quite well, Hermione?" he repeated with a trace of his usual snide.

She smiled. "You startled me, that's all," she lied.

"Indeed," he agreed. "I, too, was startled."

Then they just stood there, as though neither of them could work out what to say or do next.

Her father came to the rescue by bounding up the stairs with that boundless energy he had and stopping to grin mischievously at both of them. "So are you kids running away?"

"Daddy!" Hermione snapped, "Professor Dumbledore said I have to come back right after the reading of the will."

"Ah," said her father, and smiled. His eyes sparkled just like Dumbledore's and he offered her his arm. "Well, you can't run away without a good breakfast, so come on. We have to drive into town for this fiasco, you know."

"Oh, yes, I'd forgotten. Professor, my case?"

"It's fine, I have it," he said, and preceded them down the stairs.

Her father leaned close and winked at her.

"Why can't you be like a normal father?" she demanded once Snape was out of earshot. She knew that her mother had related her rather painful confession to her father, and this was the result. "Why don't you fly off the handle or threaten someone or something? Why do you tease me about it like it was sane?"

Dr. Granger abruptly sobered. "Hermione, if I didn't tease, I'd be screaming. You almost drove your poor mother mad with that proclamation. And, of course, I'm sure you haven't made a completely crazy choice, even if it is an ill-advised one. I'll always love you, Hermione, and there's nothing you can do that will change that. You're my baby girl - it's your job to scare me."

She laughed through a bout of fighting tears and hugged him close. "You're my first love, Daddy, forever."

He grinned and took her hand. "I know," he said, and led her into the breakfast room.

* * *

The meeting was uncomfortable for Hermione, top-filled as it was with people she didn't know, old people who glared at her as though she were a gate-crasher, and a swotty barrister who reminded her so much of Gilderoy Lockhart that she had to look at him twice to be sure. Snape kept a hand on her shoulder or her arm the whole time and glared at anyone who even looked like they might come over to her.

What Hermione received was the deed to a small house in Brighton and a little box. She refused to open it and carried it back outside with them some four hours later when the meeting ended.

Snape paused with the Grangers in a quiet, shrubbery-lined area outside the barrister's office. "Have you a piece of jewelry you commonly wear, Madam Granger?"

She turned her wrist to better display the small charm bracelet on her wrist. He looked around to ensure that they had no audience and tapped it lightly with his wand. "_Portus_," he murmured, then something else, then "_Last Refuge_."

He did the same thing to Mr. Granger's wristwatch. "These are emergency portkeys. If you find yourselves in danger in any way, you should use them by saying 'Last Refuge' aloud, twice. If for some unfathomable reason you only say it once and then find you do not need it, say anything else. They will transport you to a safe house. Your daughter will join you there, as Professor Dumbledore will be aware if either of these portkeys activate. If you lose one, both of you may use them by holding on to the one - a finger hold will do. If things you don't understand begin to happen, don't wait, use them and escape. You will find it preferable, I assure you. Do you understand?"

"Thank you, Professor," Madam Granger said by way of assurance.

They drew their daughter aside, and Snape stood quietly out of the way and waited for them to say their goodbyes. When they seemed as finished as they were going to be, he stepped in again. "Thank you for your hospitality."

"Thank you for your help," said Madam Granger.

"And your promise," added Dr. Granger.

Snape nodded and drew Hermione away and down the alleyway between the barrister's office and the bookseller next door. She trembled as he held her arm and guided her. "Are you that upset?" he asked.

"I'm confused," she said softly. "I'm sure I'll get better."

"Did you think the solicitor was that dunderhead Lockhart?" Snape asked. "I had to look at him twice."

She smiled. Apparently, Snape was taking his job as her friend very seriously, if he was joking to try to cheer her up. "I'm sorry, sir," she said. "I'll calm down."

"Good, because this isn't going to be a comfortable ride."

"Sorry?" she said, completely confused now.

He pulled a large silver pendant from under his shirt and appeared to be composing himself by breathing deeply several times.

"Do you hate portkeys, too?"

"The Dark Lord is fond of dangerous ones," he said, the only answer she was going to get. "Hold on to your case in your left hand." He caught his in his other hand lifted her hand up to wrap it around the portkey. Then, abruptly as if coming to a decision, he grabbed her around the waist with his free arm and pulled her tightly to his body.

Hermione was not prepared for the charge that went through her at the contact. She gasped and threw her head back to look up at him, but before she could make eye contact, he snapped "Hogwarts," three times and they were flying.

The portkey dropped them in Dumbledore's office. Hermione felt very strange when it ended, but even stranger when Snape let her go. He steadied her by her arms and sat her bag down on the bench Harry had conjured the other day.

When Snape went to find Dumbledore, she followed him, telling herself that she was simply confused and trying to find an explanation, but the truth was that she didn't want him out of her sight. She wanted to be with him, and wondered if she would ever find the strength within her to tell him. It was a powerful and powerless feeling, this final acknowledgement that her love for him could lead her to spend her life with him, and to do so happily.

Dumbledore came round the corner and took a seat at his desk, Snape following him calmly enough. "Mr. Potter," Dumbledore was saying, "announced that he has noticed a pronounced increase in the Dark Lord's happiness as Harry perceives it, and that he cannot find any mischief or danger to link to that feeling of increased happiness. He's worried, as am I."

"This is not a good sign," Snape agreed. "At my last invitation in mid-September, I suspected that only Bellatrix and Pettigrew are with him most of the time."

"What happened to her husband?" Hermione asked curiously.

"She probably slit his fool throat," Snape said. "I've no idea; he might be there as well."

"What does he do?"

"Brags, mainly. Bella got him thrown in Azkaban, remember."

"Sometimes I find it alarming that she of all of you has a nickname," Hermione observed caustically.

"It would alarm you further, then, to find that the Dark Lord gave it to her," Snape replied blandly.

She grinned at him and he smiled and Dumbledore just sat there at twinkled at both of them. "I am pleased to see that you've both had a pleasant weekend, even under such unpleasant circumstances. How is your family, Miss Granger?"

"My dad's quite strong, so he's recovering well. Mum's afraid for me, but happy for me, as well. They're healing. And, thanks to Professor Snape, they're safer than they've been in a long time."

"Excellent, Severus. Any problems?"

"None, Headmaster," Snape said respectfully. He opened his mouth as though to say more, then flinched and sighed. "Unfortunately, this will have to wait," he said.

Dumbledore moved quickly to touch Snape's medallion with his wand. The Headmaster was inaudible to Hermione as he whispered spells over the necklace. As soon as Dumbledore had finished, Snape turned and loped toward the door. He stopped, though, with his hand on the handle, and turned back toward them.

"Miss Granger – Hermione. The weekend was a very enlightening experience."

"Thank you, for everything, Professor. Please, please, please be careful."

"I believe you still owe me a detention," he said. "You can come for it tomorrow night at seven and I'll talk with you."

She shook her head. "You don't have to make it a detention. I'll come see you anyway." Her voice must have sounded as funny as she felt, because Dumbledore and Snape both looked at her very carefully. She smiled and waved at Snape as he gaped at her.

Snape rolled his eyes. "There's no need for theatrics, Miss Granger," he snarked, and left without a further word.

"I have to go to the library," she told Dumbledore, quickly.

He watched her eyes. "I think you need to rest for the moment, Miss Granger."

She turned to him, wide-eyed and desperate. "I'm fine," she insisted.

"I know," he said, and opened his arms.

A heartbeat passed, then two. Hermione flew into the old Headmaster's embrace and began, bitterly, to sob.


	18. Chapter 18: Orion Steps Down

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**

* * *

Chapter 18: Orion Steps Down**

From the moment he stepped into the circle, Snape felt their eyes on him - the cold, unnatural red eyes of the Dark Lord, and the hollow, heavy-lidded eyes of Bellatrix. He would have sworn the psychotic bitch was laughing at him.

There was the usual twenty minutes of listening to the Dark Lord rant, followed by three hours of mind boggling tedium as the various Death Eaters who were called to report groveled, slavered, and generally made themselves obsequious. There was the endless plotting, and the random violence punctuated by a very specific pattern of torture and reward. Snape was convinced that Avery wore kneepads under his robes from all the bowing and scraping.

After the circle finally broke, Snape having escaped completely, though mysteriously, unscathed, Pettigrew came up to him. Snape whipped out his wand and jammed it viciously under the nose of the Dark Lord's toadying slave, and laughed harshly as Pettigrew flung himself prostrate at Snape's feet. "What would your brave Gryffindor friends say to you, Wormtail, to see you down there licking my boots?" He might have gotten over most of his pointless hatred of the Marauders, but Pettigrew, the one who betrayed them, was still beneath contempt.

"Don't hurt me," Pettigrew whined. "The Dark Lord sent me to tell you to stay. He won't like it if you hurt me."

"Why not?" came the cold, high-pitched voice that was somehow hissing and sibilant, even without a single 's' in his words. "I would get the pleasure of watching you receive yet another well-deserved punishment, and then I could punish Severus for acting without orders."

Snape rolled his eyes. "I understand, my Lord," he said, then turned and bowed as one gesture.

"So proud, Severus, but you have done nothing to offend me. Does Dumbledore still trust you?"

"Completely, my Lord," he said, smoothly.

"Good." The serpentine mouth curled slightly into the closest thing the Dark Lord could come to a smile. "How is young master Potter?"

"Dumbledore keeps him guarded day and night, not so much from us, my Lord, as from some of the more... shall we say, enthusiastic of your potential initiates. You may wish to mention it to Lucius - his son is too precious a commodity to us."

"His son is a pawn," the Dark Lord snapped.

"A pawn in excellent position, my Lord," Snape reminded him. "We are all your pieces, my Lord. I know that."

"Call me a boot-licker," Pettigrew muttered. Everyone pretended not to hear him.

Bellatrix joined them, still proudly unmasked, and the only Death Eater who dared to touch Voldemort.

"Bring me the Gryffindor girl, Snape," Bellatrix ordered. "I have a need of her."

"Weasley?" he asked, his heart sinking into his boots.

"No, you idiot. Potter's mudblood companion." Her lips curled into a taunting and malignant smile.

"I've told you before, or don't you listen? Dumbledore keep the precious sextuplets under close guard, and she can't be lured, unlike the rest of them. I might can arrange the mad Ravenclaw girl, will she do?"

"I don't want one of the blood-traitor bitches that fawn around him, I want the mudblood - she's the one who remembers everything, she's most likely to have the information I need."

"But not guaranteed. Luring her into danger will make Dumbledore doubt me, and I'm unwilling to endanger my position as our Lord's spy simply for your dubious amusement." He looked at Voldemort out of the corner of his eye, hoping for some sort of sign as to how to proceed, but the Heir of Slytherin was watching the proceedings like a cat at a tennis match (complete with smug smile) and seemed completely disinterested in breaking up their conversation.

He knew what she would do next - fling herself on him and offer him her favors, followed by cheap shots against his masculinity and finally concluding with cold threats punctuated by the cruciatus curse. The only thing he didn't know was what the Dark Lord would do, and Snape hoped against hope that Voldemort would just get mad at him and kill him.

As Bella moved to the next step, he backed away sharply, and the Dark Lord reached out and caught her arm. "Come, now, Bella, Severus doesn't know our plans, and doesn't need to. Just tell him the good news and send him on his way. We have work to do."

Bella rolled her eyes, but as the Dark Lord was now behind her, only Snape was in a position to see this. He decided to save the smirk of wicked satisfaction for later.

"She will come to you, Snape. We're sure of it," Bellatrix said. Then she took the Dark Lord's arm and they walked away together to their chosen apparation point.

Pettigrew rose slowly to his feet. "You may go," he said arrogantly.

Snape snarled, itching to turn him into a guppy and leave him to flop out the last of his miserable life on dry land. Instead, reaching into a bag of tricks he had always wanted to forget, he waved Peter away, waited until the animagus was about 50 yards ahead, and charmed his clothes - every scrap and stitch of them - to reek of flowers.

The sound of Pettigrew shrieking as he charged away from a swarm of enthusiastic and helpful insects was truly music to his ears. Snape considered it a successful experiment as it obviously never occurred to the rat to actually transform.

The Dog Star was still high in the sky as he walked toward a good apparation point. Looking up at it, he grinned. "You owe me," he said. The star twinkled back in good-natured agreement.

* * *

Telling Dumbledore something unpleasant from the Death Eaters' circle had never been harder. Snape trudged up the gargoyle guarded staircase and was surprised to notice that his hand on the door handle was trembling horribly. The old man looked up with a smile of such obvious pleasure that Snape felt himself smiling back, despite the fact that he was sure he was shaking in his shoes.

Analyzing that reaction would take awhile, so Snape filed it away for later.

Fawkes swooped down from his perch and landed on the back of Snape's chair, then let out that single, plaintive cry that had always set the Potions Master's teeth on edge in the past. For some reason, tonight it made him feel warm and comforted, as though this would have to work itself out somehow.

Dumbledore seemed to take all this in very quietly, for he sat watching Snape with an expression of bemused wonder. "What?" Snape demanded crossly.

Dumbledore smiled benignly at him. "I take it the evening did not agree with you." He scribbled a quick note on a scroll and held it out for Fawkes. The phoenix flitted over and took the missive and then vanished in a showy ball of fire.

Snape scowled at him. "What was that about? Couldn't you floo Minerva?"

"No," Dumbledore replied. "Miss Granger refused to go to bed until I promised to let her know when you were safe."

The trembling started again, and this time it didn't stop. Snape opened his mouth to make an acid observation, but what fell out was hardly acid at all, but rather bleak disgust and bone-deep fear. It certainly felt like acid when he found himself choking over trying to get her name out.

* * *

"Making up your homework, Hermione?" Harry asked politely, worried that she hadn't said more than a quick hello to them in the entire eight hours she had been home.

"No," she said. "I'm studying portkeys."

"I hate portkeys," Harry said conversationally.

"So does Professor Snape," she muttered. "So do I, when it comes to it. I'm looking to see if there's a way to block them."

"What, you can portkey places you can't apparate?" She looked up at him and her glare was so Snape-like that Harry backed off half a pace. "Man, I didn't know he was contagious."

Hermione proved him wrong by laughing over that one. "So's Ron, apparently - you sound just like him."

Harry smiled sheepishly. "Yeah, a little, but he's my best friend from way back. When did Snape become yours?"

She grinned in what Harry interpreted as a completely naughty fashion. "This weekend. We had long conversations about our dreams in life, and pledged blood siblinghood, and we did each other's hair and makeup and everything."

Ginny tumbled into the conversation at that exact moment. "Oh, I know he looked simply darling in your Gryffindor red nail polish."

Hermione giggled. "Hey, you should see the dress he picked out for me!"

Ron flopped on the end of the sofa now, chuckling. "Please tell me you're not making this up and you got pictures."

Ginny thumped her brother with a pillow. "Idiot child," she snapped in a brilliant Snape imitation.

Hermione giggled. "He's much more pleasant when you get used to him," she added on a more serious note.

They all looked at each other and nodded, then turned as one and smiled at her kindly. "We're sure, Hermione," Ginny said soothingly. "Maybe we'll get a chance later, ok?"

Hermione was blinking at them, her face betraying utter puzzlement, interrupted when a ball of fire appeared just in front of her. "Oh, thank Merlin," she breathed and snatched the missive from Fawkes.

Harry looked intently at the others. They all nodded and tiptoed away quickly. "We're over here if you need us," he said softly and, once she had nodded, he moved away to allow her her privacy, but not before he had seen that the letter was from Dumbledore, used the words "Snape" and "safe", and also that Hermione was crying.

"Her eyes look funny," Ginny said.

"She's been crying is all," Harry and Ron assured her.

"This is so hard," said Neville. "I hate seeing her hurt like this - do you think Professor Dumbledore knows?"

"No," said Ron, "but I'm going to the library tomorrow - I want to look up some things."

"I'll help you," Neville volunteered.

"I wonder if we still have class Thursday?" said Harry.

"Probably," Ron said, "unless Snape's dead by then."

"Oh God," said Ginny, looking over at Hermione's fragile-looking form bending over yet another book, "please don't say that."

Ron looked at her, too. "Definitely not," he agreed softly.

* * *

Severus Snape spent all day Tuesday avoiding Hermione Granger. He felt he had a very good reason to do so. Dumbledore would probably force feed him poison if he caught Snape anywhere near the Head Girl after the revelations of last night. Of course, Dumbledore hadn't looked homicidal. He hadn't even given the look Snape most feared - the disappointed stare. The Potions Master had to agree – he couldn't be anything but an old pervert.

Snape felt he had done the right, if slightly Slytherin, thing to do by keeping the details to himself. He was sure they would anger and upset Dumbledore, and he told himself that Dumbledore should be furious with him, even as he told himself that Dumbledore deserved to hear better things from those in which he placed his confidence. The details just wouldn't bear the light of scrutiny, he thought in a noble fashion.

He crumbled into his armchair. Some of the details were simply too precious to ruin. Waking Monday morning and believing right up until the moment he opened his eyes that he would find her lying beside him, warm and welcoming and tender, was one memory he would hold sacred even if he lived another hundred years. But so was the memory of the look on her face when she told him how sorry she was that his life had been like it was - an innocent expression of clear-eyed empathy, forgiving and understanding at the same time. And the memory of the dream where they grew old in each other's company, as lovers, friends, and partners, was enough to keep him warm without the fire blazing in his quarters in front of him.

The depths of his loneliness could explain them all, of course. Self-exile was still exile, and he generally avoided anyone who tried to violate it. He had begun, over the past decade, to suspect that he wasn't meant to live in the Wizarding world at large.

Then, leave it to a blasted Gryffindor to try to tug him out. He was too strong for nonsense like that.

He tossed another log onto the fire, watching it turn dark and start to smolder. How could he explain the way her smile had felt like summer breeze? How could explain the nearly overwhelming desire to carry her away where no one could ever hurt her again? And how, how could explain the thrill he felt, like a tiny warming charm inside him, every time he caught a glimpse of her. He told himself, desperately, that he hadn't been looking for her, not at all. He was merely trying to avoid her, and the only way he could do that was to ensure that he always saw her first.

Staring into the fire, he thought hard about his sheer terror as he related to Dumbledore what Bellatrix had demanded. He remembered the confused delight he had felt when Dumbledore told him Hermione was worried about him. He remembered how good she had felt when they took the portkey together. He would never confess to anyone the courage he had had to summon to hold her that closely nor the control he had needed to hold her _only_ that closely.

But he knew. Deep down in a vault in his soul, behind walls thirty feet thick with anger and pain and resigned black despair, was the truth, and he believed it, even as he paid lip-service to the denial closer to the surface. It was a majestic truth, a powerful one, an utterly crippling and disabling one. He couldn't hand her over to the Dark Lord, not even as bait for a trap. No matter what Dumbledore decided, Snape knew that he would sell his life dearly, but willingly, for her absolute safety.

Severus Snape was in love, for perhaps the first time in his life.

And so he resolved that he would never see her again. She would be safe, and he could tell the Dark Lord very honestly that Bellatrix was wrong, that Miss Granger was never anywhere near him except in her classes, which he could hardly snatch her from directly under Dumbledore's nose. He would not have to blow his cover and Bellatrix would have to answer for it. If this was going to destroy him – and he was sure it would – then it would be best if it destroyed Bellatrix, too.

With that grim decision calming his mind, Snape left the sanctity of his dungeon and went wandering in the late night stillness. The cold comfort of knowing that he had chosen yet another thing that was right but not easy was not the balm it should have been. Neither was the black silence of his nightly hunt for children behaving badly. He headed up to the fourth floor, unconsciously hoping that the library would bring her closer in his mind, since she would never be closer in fact.

He imagined her shocked expression if he told her. She was Hermione, so she would be kind, her rosebud lips would part with bald shock while turning down in intolerable pity. The second floor where the staff-room was passed by with only the flicker of remembering huge, chocolate brown eyes staring at him while she stammered and hunted desperately in her mind for some excuse – which she wasn't any good at. He passed a dozen places thick with memory, but none was so strong as the library.

Speaking of which, there was a faint light coming from there, and a sound like soft complaining.

Someone would pick _her_ library to be arguing in the middle of the night. Of course, as he got closer, he began to suspect that he really was going to go mad. He could swear he was hearing her voice, and what was more, he would swear he heard her name.

He slipped out of the shadow finally, and to both his horror and relief, he found her, sitting there in the unruly nimbus of her bushy brown hair and murmuring quietly to herself. She was probably annoyed with her friends, he realized, because she had a frustrated look on her face and was definitely repeating her own name. Just before he could decide whether to approach her or flee for all his life was worth (though it wasn't much in his opinion), she looked up and took the decision out of his hands by smiling at him with such obvious pleasure that he could almost believe, for just a moment, that his new found love wasn't so unrequited as he thought.


	19. Chapter 19: The Stars From His Coat

**I confess that this is a very short chapter and the reason it is very short is because I worked this out wrong in my head. If I ever get possessed of a demonic urge to edit this, I will fix it. 'Til then, enjoy this, because I'm proud of it. Oh, and you're all right about the box. Anything else you notice that was interesting?**

**I'll see you this evening with the epic concluding chapters of…**

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**

* * *

Chapter 19: The Stars From His Coat**

"Hello, Professor," she said softly. He gaped at her as though she had fallen in from the sky, but she continued undeterred, smiling at him, trying to let him know everything with her eyes. "I have something for you."

He stepped back. "I'm on rounds," he growled. "And you should be in your tower."

She didn't understand why he was acting like this - like he always had. Hadn't they agreed to be friends? "I'll go with you. I'm Head Girl, I can do that."

"No."

"You weren't in your office earlier," she said, "so it'll have to be this way, I suppose." She caught her bag in her hand and followed after him. He seemed to disappear into the shadows, but Hermione was determined. She had always done everything she set her mind to do, so she set her mind to this as well.

She followed him around the castle for what felt like hours, but couldn't find him anywhere. Occasionally, she would catch a hint of a moving shadow or the click of a distant footfall but there was very little sign of the invisible Potions Master anywhere.

In the end, she came to rest on the astronomy tower, looking out at the grounds and wondering what was going wrong. Her head hurt, and right now she wondered what she was thinking following him all over the place like a lost puppy. So he was her friend, that didn't mean he was aware of the depth of her feeling for him. Where had all her logic, all her common sense, gone? So what if she loved him. That didn't mean he had to love her too.

She turned to walk away, to head back to her bed and sleep away what was left of the night. She thought she might go talk to Madam Pomfrey in the morning, since her stress level was obviously so high and so strained that she was making senseless trips after reluctant professors.

Turning away, she saw him, waiting there in the doorway, standing unmoved against the night breezes, watching her, apparently, and looking like he was in terrible pain. She couldn't resist it at all and moved toward him, her hand outstretched like a plaintive waif.

He stepped away again and the look of pain only deepened. "Hermione Granger," he pleaded, his voice desperate and hollow, "will you please stop haunting me?"

"Professor," she said, but stopped and started over. "Severus, I can't. I love you, Severus, and I want to be with you." His name felt delicious on her lips, like dark, raw honey, like fresh Holland chocolate, bittersweet and rich. She wanted to shout it, whisper it, say it first every day of her life, and when she repeated it, add words of love and solace to the mix. She waited breathlessly for him to shout at her, to tell her she was a silly child, or worse. She waited to be hurt, hoping because there was nothing else left, to be loved in return.

He lifted his dark, immutable gaze to her face, his eyes the same as she had come to know them, concerned but distant, with the faintest trace of confusion. And finally, finally, as she watched, the confusion broke, once and for all, and his face became flooded with emotions so myriad and strong that she wondered he could breathe for the raging tide of it. "Hermione," he whispered, a prayer, a sigh, and reached out to cup her chin, bent his head forward, touched her at last with fingers cold and roughened by work. At last she felt the brush of his hand against her skin, at last she felt his breath on her face.

At last she felt the touch of his lips.

It was as though he had flung the stars from his coat and created the heavens of the night just for her. The splendor, the marvel of it was as much visual as tactile, and as much smell and taste as the others. All her dreams, all her imaginings, became at once dim shades of the truth, and glorious possibilities. The flood in her breast of pain and of joy was so strong it transfigured her - she became a flame, burning bright and endless, burning just for him, for his love. It changed her life, her world, everything.

He lifted his head and gazed deep into her eyes, waiting to see the shock there, the horror, the confusion. He saw only pleasure, painted with longing, and dipped in the knowledge that this could be just the beginning. He had never imagined that it was not too late, had never thought, even once, that he might not have missed his chance. She smiled deep into his eyes and he brushed back her hair, longing to crush her to him, barely restraining the thought of sweeping her up and carrying her away from the castle, away from the war, away from the world altogether if he had to to find them a life they could share.

Severus knew, just as surely as he knew that Dumbledore was kind, that Hermione would not go away with him. He wouldn't really want to - she had friends and he had responsibilities, and they all owed their allegiance to the gentle old man who held the darkness at bay. Easier to run, but to hear that she loved him gave him all the strength he would ever need to face what was coming.

"I have something for you," she said, again.

"What is it?" he asked, and marveled that the voice speaking was his own. When had it become kitten soft and gentle?

"The ring my Aunt Gretchen gave me. It was her husband's. They lived together in love for fifty-five years. I want you to have it."

"Me?" he said. "I don't deserve this."

"Of course you do. It's yours, Severus, no matter what, so I will always be with you, just a little, to remind you that I love you. Just say my name and you'll be with me." She held it out to him and, amazed, he took it from her, studying the stone in perplexity. It was a narrow silver band with six tiny stones on it, mismatched, unfaceted, unpolished, beautiful in their natural state. He solemnly slipped it on his right hand and then took her hand in his. "I can't tell you what this means to me, Hermione, to have you tell me this, and share these things with me." He bent his head again, to taste those moon-etched lips, and was rendered completely breathless when they parted beneath his assault.

More time passed before he remembered something much more important. "We need to leave, Hermione. This was really a very bad idea."

She laughed. "I think it was a marvelous idea, but perhaps there would be problems..."

"Your Gryffindor friends are REALLY not going to like this one."

Again that merry twinkle, and she took his arm as though he were her escort to a ball. "My Gryffindor friends love me enough to want me to be happy, Severus, and I think they're brave enough to learn to live with it as long as I am happy."

"Don't expect me to be nice to them."

"Haven't you noticed that any time you try, someone pulls a wand on you?"

He nodded and charmed the door at the bottom of the tower to fling itself open with an almighty thud. Since no one screamed and fled, he knew it was safe for them to proceed.

"You are a Slytherin to the core, Severus," she said admiringly and stood on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek.

"Thank you," he said and a small tickle of pride rolled over him. She was so good for his ego. They walked slowly toward Gryffindor tower, conversing lightly about the weather or fairies in the corridor, or the best places to find students out of bounds. He would never remember that, but he did remember how light-hearted and happy it felt. It was as though all the evil his life was paying for had finally taken a rest.

"I have a headache," Hermione said, as she stood before the portrait a large woman in a loudly pink dress.

And so the pendulum swung the other way.

"Can't I just go with you?"

All the breath escaped his lungs and his heart began to race like a new Nimbus. There were three hundred answers to that question, and 299 of them were absolutely inappropriate, even though he was screaming inside to just agree with her and die happy when whatever better person than he arrived and killed him for it. He forced himself to take several slow, deep breaths, then a few more, then looked down to study her very carefully.

She tipped her delicate face up to him, her eyes batting closed, her lips curved in charming invitation, her eyelashes delicate against her softly blushing face. Before he could even stop himself, he had bent to brush those perfect lips lightly with his own, feeling the entire world collapse and fall away the moment they met. He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her to him, just as she entwined her arms behind his head, pulling him deeper into the spiraling descent of the their kiss. The insistence as she pressed herself to him would have been alarming had he not been completely intoxicated with the taste of her, the smell of her. Having been alone for so long made her all the more addictive, and it was all he could do to gently disengage from her and stand there panting in the hall, watching her warily as she stood there gasping and blushing and swaying on the spot.

He groaned and leaned his head back against the wall, desperately afraid of how desperately happy he was.

She looked up and smiled at him, her blue eyes twinkling softly in the torchlight of the corridor, bright and vivid even by those pale standards. And his newfound heart shattered into a million pieces. So blue, they were, so beautiful, so ethereal and so utterly, unspeakably wrong.

Even as everything turned chiaroscuro and cold again around him, everything also clicked. Everything. "Come with me, Miss Granger," he said, and he knew his voice was thick with unshed tears. "I'm sorry, we have to go see Professor Dumbledore."


	20. Chapter 20: 'Til Heaven

_Enjoy this one – there's one more to go, and if I don't get it done tonight, I will put it up first thing in the morning. I don't dare rush through them, but I don't want to miss my deadline, either. I hope you liked that last and caught on to my little piece of mischief. As for DD approving or not… I can't imagine that, if love were real, he could disapprove, simply because that's his theme, plus they're adults and, just to clear one last hurdle, when Dumbledore was either of their ages, men twice Snape's age routinely married girls half of Hermione's. (Ok, I'm exaggerating; 9 year olds were a little uncommon. 12, however…) He wouldn't appreciate the strain to the school, however, I'm sure._

**

* * *

Touch the Air Softly**

**by Jessa L'Rynn**

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**Chapter 20: 'Til Heaven**

Dumbledore looked up from his book, to find an angry Potions Master storming across his office, robes billowing, his face the very picture of rage. "Something is wrong," Snape snarled, the moment he knew he had Dumbledore's attention.

Dumbledore nodded, and turned his face to the plaintively whimpering Head Girl trailing Severus like a suppliant, one small hand clutched on the corner of his robes. "I see," he said. "Is Miss Granger hurt?"

Severus' face became, if possible, even darker. "Yes, and we were fools not to notice it."

"I'm not hurt, Severus," she said in a sweet little voice. "I'll be fine, but I think I really should get some sleep before class."

Dumbledore's heart ached to hear that sound. It was so unlike Hermione, so he knew Severus' assessment to be correct. However, it was not only her voice but also Severus' face that made him so terribly sad. He didn't pry and couldn't get an exact sense of what was happening, but what was obvious was that something was torturing Severus and there was nothing he could do about it. "What's happened?"

The Potions Master escorted the Head Girl very close to Dumbledore's desk and very tenderly tilted her face up toward the light. Dumbledore was more interested in reading the ache in Severus's face, and the unhappy pallor in Miss Granger's for a moment before he realized what exactly was wrong. "I take it she hasn't charmed her eye color?"

"No!" the younger man shouted, "Why would anyone do a stupid thing like that? She's enchanted."

"What are her symptoms?"

Hermione stomped her foot and glared at first one man, then the other. "I am not having symptoms. I am in love with him. I admit it was a rather sudden confession, but what did he want? A full page ad?"

"Don't you dare, you silly child."

"Oh, we're back to that, now, are we?" she snapped.

"A moment of your time, Miss Granger, and then I'll send for Professor McGonagall to escort you to the hospital wing."

"I'd rather stay with him," she said softly.

"I see," said Dumbledore. "I need to speak to Severus alone, Miss Granger. I'll send him to you as soon as I can."

She nodded and they all waited in silence while he floo'd McGonagall and she came to get Hermione. The saddest thing about it, in Dumbledore's opinion, was the way she reached for Severus with one hand, and how he reached out, seemingly without thinking about it, and touched her for a moment before he caught himself and jumped away from her like a repelling charm. There was a bitter taste in the old man's mouth as he heard his deputy start up the stairs - the loneliest man he had ever known had finally found the potential for great love, and every thing about it was completely, utterly wrong.

"Minerva, would you be so good as to escort Miss Granger to the hospital wing?" he asked as soon as she arrived.

She nodded and waited for Hermione to join her. "I really think I'd better stay with Professor Snape," Hermione said calmly.

Severus sighed and reached into his coat. "Hermione, love, drink this. It will help you feel better, and I'll come see you as soon as I can."

She beamed at the Slytherin, even as her Gryffindor head of house stood in the back ground with her hand over her open mouth. "Count backward from ten for me," he said as soon as she'd drunk the blue potion.

"Ten nine... eight... seven...sevenus... Severus... Love you."

He picked up her hand and gently placed it over her chest, then conjured a stretcher for her to ride on.

Minerva maintained admirable control and guided the stretcher out of the room, closing the door gently behind her.

"I'm so sorry, Albus," Severus said, his face in his hands.

"For what? I saw no impropriety on your part."

"That's because you weren't on the astronomy tower," said Snape. "I've failed you, I..."

"What happened?"

The story Severus told was beautiful, but so sad as he was fighting tears with every single word he said. "I don't think I can bear to see the disgust in her eyes when she wakes up tomorrow."

"You don't think she meant it?"

He snorted and proceeded to embed a pencil into an apple from the desk in front of him. "No one loves me, Albus. I'd lost my mind to even entertain the notion."

Dumbledore shook his head. "Severus, I do not think she will be free of this curse in the morning. This is not some unlikely childhood hex."

"What do you mean?"

"There's something familiar about it, but I can't place it. Still, I know where you must start from the information you gave me last night."

The younger man gaped at him blindly for a moment, then rose from his seat as Death rising from his black throne. "Bellatrix," he snarled. "I'll kill her."

"I need to know what the curse was," Dumbledore said. "Don't forget that in your fury."

Severus nodded.

"I'm sorry you've been hurt, Severus."

"I don't feel a thing," he lied, though Dumbledore couldn't think why he bothered, since they both knew better.

"I wish you a speedy recovery from nothing, then. Please be careful - she'll never forgive you if you aren't."

"She'll get over it as soon as the spell breaks," he said sadly.

Dumbledore studied him closely. "When you find out about the spell, see if you can find out why your eyes are turning blue, too."

* * *

Snape snuck quietly through the bushes outside the dilapidated old building the Dark Lord was currently using for headquarters. He was looking for a convenient distraction.

Around the second corner, Wormtail was puffing away on a cigarette, blissfully ignorant of the world around him. Snape decided to summon the world around Wormtail to make the animagus more aware. Specifically, he summoned a piece of lead piping over Wormtail's head and watched it drop. Wormtail crumpled and collapsed, snoring heavily, onto the damp carpet of pine straw around the trees. He considered killing the useless creature, again, but he needed the vile creature to set his plan in motion.

He used a sticking charm and glued Wormtail to a tree branch and charmed his clothes to sparkling red and gold. It made the lapsed Gryffindor stand out vividly against the dark wood and the dark house. In the distance, morning was starting to break loose, and Snape was exhausted, but he was going to see this resolved before he even considered sleep. Not that he would actually sleep, with Hermione's perfect, flowerlike face turned up to his every time he closed his eyes.

He hexed Wormtail's trousers so they would fall down any time someone said "You-know-who". What he was planning for Bellatrix would have to be done carefully. But Pettigrew could inherit the full brunt of his annoyance without undue effect.

"_Morsmordre_," he murmured, then apparated to the other side of the lawn as the Dark Mark rose, malignant and glittering, above the tree where Wormtail dangled. Performing another quick charm with his wand to clear it just in case, he ducked into the shadows as the Dark Lord himself went gliding by, followed by the dry, rasping sound of the alarmingly large snake, Nagini, following her master.

As soon as he entered the mansion, he found her, smiling proudly from a chair by the huge bay window. "Good morning, Severus. Our Lord has gone to investigate a strange occurrence."

"Oh, and what's happened?" he asked her dryly.

"The Dark Mark has been cast here," she said, her voice husky and excited.

"That's new," he murmured. "Tell me, Bellatrix, what did you mean when you said that the girl would follow me?"

She smirked at him malevolently and crossed the room to his side, looking him over with an appraising eye. "I meant that she would follow you, that she would come here with you willingly. Why? Lonely?" She growled low in her throat and sidled up to him with her long fingers extended toward his arm.

"Don't touch me with that, you don't know where it's been."

"Very funny," she snapped. Then her eyes glittered and she inched closer again.

Snape had never actually understood why she always tried her seductive maneuver on him and decided once and for all to find out. "What do you want from me, you psychotic shrew?"

"Nice alliteration there," she said, and began to sway, snakelike, in front of him. "I want you, obviously. So tell me, what do you want to know about the girl?"

"I want to know what you did, of course," he said, and raised his hands to cup her shoulders and hold her still.

She made some other animal noise and reached for his face with one blood-colored fingernail. "What will you give me if I tell you?"

Every single drop of rage and pain this night had inflicted on him when thrumming through him like the chords of an off-key violin. His hand snapped up and he crushed it, tightly, against her throat. "Tell me what you did, Bellatrix, or you can join the rest of your disgusting family in hell."

She closed her eyes briefly, then opened them and grinned at him. "I always knew you'd like it rough, Sev. Just don't hit my face, people will ask questions."

He tightened his grip and she shivered, actually shivered and gave a moan that was clearly not from pain. "Oh for the love of evil and black magic!" he roared. "Control yourself, woman, this is not foreplay."

"Feels like it to me," she said. "Don't like it – try something else."

"When did you become such a sad, pathetic little slut, Bella?" he sneered.

She snorted. "What's the matter, Sevvie? Don't have pretty little Gryffindors pursuing you yet?"

He dropped her and she crumpled up on the floor. "No, the intolerable little wench has started following me everywhere, and I want to know why."

Her brow crumpled. "That's not right," she said. "It should take longer."

"Bella, what did you do!"

"It's Vivienne's Curse, do you like it?" said the high, cold voice from the doorway. "Fascinating work, with the tree, Severus, but was it really necessary?"

"I don't know anything about a tree, my Lord," he said, carefully shielding his mind and looking the Dark Lord directly in his cold, red eyes.

"Ah," said the Dark Lord. "Dumbledore knows about the spell, does he, and you think he is questioning your loyalties." He smiled his cold half-smile again and added, "If I didn't need you there, Severus, I might feel guilty to leave you with a master who changes so quickly."

"Normally, Dumbledore wouldn't suspect me, but innocent little Gryffindors don't fall in love with greasy Death Eaters very often." He rounded on Bella. "Thought it was funny, I suppose? Nailing some filthy little mudblood know-it-all to my tail? Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?"

"It is a very old curse," she said. "I needed to test its efficacy before I turn it on Potter. You said she was the intelligent one, the logical one. If it can override her intelligence, it will certainly override his fragile defenses. I haven't decided who, yet, but I'll be taking volunteers, if you'd like Potter to join the ranks of your admiring fans."

"That won't work – Miss Granger would claw his eyes out."

"Now, now," said Voldemort, "don't be ungrateful. You can have her, you know, she's yours for a plaything. Bring her to me so I can question her and if she survives, she's yours, or you can take her back to Dumbledore as her brave rescuer for all I care. And, as your reward for loyalty, I might let you kill Bella, since you want to so much."

Her head snapped up and then she flung herself on the Dark Lord's feet, wailing and pleading desperately to know what she had done to offend him. "I am your most loyal servant," she implored him, all trace of her haughty demeanor vanished in begging for her life.

The Dark Lord laughed that unnatural laugh of his, and turned to Snape who was retreating slowly to the door. "You may go."

Snape nodded. "Thank you, my Lord," he said.

"And I don't need to remind you, my Severus, but if you _don't_ bring me the girl, I'll let Bella kill you, instead."

Snape stalked out into the blue and perfect early morning light. As he apparated back to Hogsmeade and began the trek back to the school, he couldn't help thinking that he didn't care. He would never stop loving the soft, golden skin, the rich, rosy lips, the warm, welcoming smile. And, if he had to leave the world and wait 'til heaven to see it instead, then he was better off and better for it.

Reporting to Dumbledore did not help him feel any better. He found the old man in the hospital wing, watching over Hermione, with Miss Lovegood for company. "Your eyes are turning, too," Dumbledore said, "and I don't know if I have a book on that curse."

Snape looked at himself in a medicine chest and realized, to his astonishment, that Dumbledore's proclamation was absolutely correct. His formerly black, angry eyes, were swirled through and through with vivid streaks of palest blue.

"It's in the 'Merlin' section, under Nimue," said Luna.

Dumbledore nodded. "That would be the place for it, of course," he agreed. "I feared without Miss Granger awake the library would be lonely. Could you go retrieve that book, Miss Lovegood? Send it with Mr. Potter, if you wouldn't mind, I need to speak to him as well." Dumbledore seemed to be waiting for Miss Lovegood to leave, because he did not speak again until the doors closed behind her. "What you told me last night – is that all of what passed between you?"

"Yes, sir, everything that happened." Dumbledore looked at him strangely. Snape looked down at the girl. He had told Dumbledore of every real moment they spent together, every real touch they shared – how sitting on her veranda with a wine glass he had let her hold his hand. How could he say that before that, they had shared an entire, long lifetime of dreams and thoughts and memories together, at least in his imagination? He had confessed that he first kissed her on the astronomy tower. How could he admit that, not two days before that, he had been so caught up in the idea of making love to her that he had believed without a doubt it was happening?

Dumbledore smiled at him and let it go. "The book should arrive shortly, and I'll need to talk with Mr. Potter. I want you to think back on when something first passed between you and Miss Granger – a look, a smile, anything?"

He sighed and realized that one of these things he'd tried so hard to hold in would have to be spoken aloud. "I've used legilimency on her before," he confessed.

Dumbledore smiled. "There's no harm in keeping in practice, as long as you didn't invade her privacy. Lie down there on the next bed and think about it for a while. Let me know when you remember."

As soon as Snape's head hit the pillow, so too did his exhausted body hit its limit. He was gone, and knew no more.


	21. Chapter 21: Ever is Now

**Touch the Air Softly **

**by Jessa L'Rynn **

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best". _

**

* * *

Chapter 21: Ever is Now**

When Harry arrived at the hospital wing, he found Dumbledore waiting for him with a grim and worried expression. His twinkling blue eyes weren't, and he seemed listless and very, very old. Harry sighed as he dropped the very heavy pile of tomes he was lugging into the chair beside the Headmaster and popped up on the bed next to Hermione.

"How is she?" he asked.

"She'll be awake soon, and we'll know. Right now, she thinks she is in love with Severus. I want you students to come up here and sit with Hermione - I'll clear it with your professors. I'm going to take Severus to his rooms myself. You must keep her here and you must keep her focused. Until I we can work out how to undo LeStrange's curse, we'll have to keep her from him."

"Not that I want her with him," said Harry, "but why keep them apart? Why not keep them where we can watch them?"

"Harry, I've known all of you for most of your lives, even Miss Granger, who I've watched turn from a gangly, frightened young girl into a woman of courage and dignity. I know her moods and her joys and I know her sorrows very well. Yet her display of affection the other night was so genuine as to seem fully real to me. I can only say that, in her current state, Miss Granger believes it utterly."

"Do you think he might hurt her?" Harry demanded.

"No, Harry, I think it will hurt him." The old man sighed. "Severus has not always been a good man and only rarely has he ever been kind. But he has always been lonely and he has always deserved better, as have you, as have so many others you and I have known. But in those few moments that he believed, he was sure that something better was being offered, along with endless possibility. To find out that it is only a conniving spell has cut him to the bone. I don't know if he'll recover, but I must do everything to help him try."

"I understand." He frowned. "Sir, who will you have do the research on the spells?"

Dumbledore smiled at him warmly. "After seven years, I've learned to watch you children most carefully. I have learned much from your methods. As a group, the six of you are uniquely suited to find the answers."

Harry smiled. "That will keep Hermione occupied very well, Professor."

"I will send for the others. Harry, there is one thing I must ask you."

"I'll let you know immediately if I catch the whiff of half-dead Dark Lord."

Dumbledore chuckled. "He's going to get the suspicion that you're not taking him seriously."

Harry smiled a bitter half-smile. "It'll do him good," he said.

* * *

When Hermione woke up, she heard Ginny speaking. "It says that Vivienne sent her hand-maid, Nimue, to entice Merlin. To ensure that the enticement succeeded, she cursed her hand-maiden, and the curse drew Merlin to her."

"Well, that's true," Ron said. "Merlin is reputed to have chased Nimue like Harry's dad chased his mum."

Harry chuckled. "Yeah, except my dad caught my mum."

"As I was saying," Ginny said loudly, "Merlin might very well have caught Nimue, but no one will ever know."

"Oh?"

"Vivienne used his desire for Nimue to seal him in the ice caves."

"Desire," Luna murmured dreamily.

"That is an odd word, isn't it?" asked Neville. "Shouldn't it have been love?"

"You've got that book," Ron replied. "Look it up."

"OK, OK," Neville said. There was a lot of flipping of pages. Hermione wanted to open her eyes and help them find what they were looking for, but she was too upset and too unhappy. Every sense she had told her that Severus was no where near her, and that made her hurt all over, in her heart, in her head, in her stomach. Maybe she didn't want to wake up after all.

"It says that love is indomitable and cannot be created or destroyed."

"Like matter," Harry said. The resounding silence following that was probably the sound of four young wizards gaping at the Boy-Who-Lived. He chuffed. "What, do you guys think you just summon stuff up out of nothing? It comes from somewhere, I'm sure."

"Cliodna's kettle, now he's catching Hermione's brains," said Ginny. "Harry, I swear we didn't mean to let her corrupt you."

Then all of them collapsed laughing, and she knew that because she distinctly felt Ginny and Luna collide with her shoulders, and Harry and Ron bouncing next to her legs. "Oi, watch the cat," said Neville.

"Argh," said Ron, and the sound of a hiss and Ron swearing quietly punctuated the exclamation. She felt the pleasant weight of Crookshanks on her leg and smiled a little to herself.

There was a sudden amount of whispering. "I understand," said Ron, "that Merlin actually invented House Elves."

'You can't invent living being, Ron,' she thought.

"Yes," announced Harry, "the House Elf never would have existed without wizards and so there is no reason for a House Elf to be free."

Hermione snickered, at least inside her head. They were laying it on thick.

"My goodness, Harry," said Ginny, meticulously precise, "that is a brilliant observation. You should write it up and send it to the Daily Prophet. That insightful news source has been well known to accept such thought-provoking assessments before."

This made her want to grind her teeth.

"I would love to, Ginny, but I have to join that marvelous Cornelius Fudge for tea tomorrow."

"Ah," said Neville. "I shall be joining you, of course, as your understudy."

Now, she wanted to start laughing again.

"Perhaps we should let Professor Lockhart know Hermione is ill. He'll want to send a get well card." This was Luna at her dreamy, mythical best.

'Don't you dare,' thought Hermione.

"Her eyes are as brown as a flat Diet Coke," Harry caroled, in a surprisingly pleasant baritone.

"Her hair is a bushy sensation!" sang Ginny.

"She's really quite mad," added Ron.

"In a good way, not bad," chirped Neville and Luna together.

"The brains of this operation!" they all finished the horrible song in completely melodramatic five part harmony.

She couldn't help it. She started laughing, choked a bit, sat up, and laughed some more. Her eyes watered, and she realized she couldn't stop.

* * *

Snape woke with some difficulty to the groggy sense that he was not where he had been when he'd gone to sleep. It was a talent he had picked up quite young. Being on the opposite side from Sirius Black and James Potter had taught him to be very aware of minute changes in his environment. Today, he determined quickly that he was not alone and also not in danger. There was the co-mingled smell of lemon and Minerva McGonagall's perfume on the air that told him more than he really wanted to know. He heard a soft snore and found that rather strange and so resigned himself to being shocked by something.

Opening his eyes, he found the Headmaster and his deputy sleeping in chintz armchairs at the foot of his bed. Specifically, they were sleeping leaning on each other.

"What in Merlin's name is the time?" he demanded.

Dumbledore started and looked at the twelve handed watch on his wrist. "It's 3:30. Go back to sleep."

"I have to meet with him," Snape said.

"Not anymore," said Dumbledore. "We're going to lift the spell and you are going to recover in whatever way you deem necessary and I deem acceptable, and we are going to move on."

"What about needing a spy?" he demanded, angrily.

"No, Severus."

"Why not?" Snape shouted, his voice sounding shrill and squeakish even in his own ears.

"I won't risk your life."

"I'll tell him you sent her away somewhere. He won't doubt it, I can lie to his face, Dumbledore."

"I know you can, Severus, but it is too dangerous. Besides, I don't want him knowing how particularly effective this application of that curse was."

"Oh," he said, and immediately began to feel useless to go along with all the other numbing, debilitating, and cruel emotions.

"Minerva will stay with you, Severus," said Dumbledore. "I need to go check on some other things."

"How are you feeling?" asked Minerva kindly as Dumbledore left the room.

Snape rolled his eyes. "Like taking poison," he said, and went to cabinet he kept locked across the room. "Care to join me?"

"What sort of poison did you have in mind?" she asked warily.

He smiled sadistically and held up a bottle of finest Ogden's Old.

* * *

"There's got to be something we're missing," said Ginny. "This only explains the effect on Hermione. It doesn't say anything about Snape."

"I can't understand how any spell that's supposed to effect me made him think he loves me," said Hermione. "I was so stupid. He's going to hate me forever. I should have just kept it to myself."

"Kept what to yourself, Miss Granger?" said Dumbledore as he came in. "You cannot be blamed for what this sort of magic made you believe."

"You don't understand, sir," she said and turned back to thumbing through the books. "How is Severus? Can I see him?"

Dumbledore sighed and shook his head. She nodded and turned her eyes back to the book but looked, in Dumbledore's opinion, decidedly canny.

Ginny and Harry were making copious notes while Ron read passages quietly to Luna and she jotted down what they discovered.

"What have you found?" the Headmaster asked, finally, after watching them for several minutes.

"We've found the name and origin of the curse, sir," reported Ron, and explained about Nimue and Merlin.

"And the nature of it?"

Ginny sighed. "From all records we can find, it induces desire. The documents all state that it is impossible to cause love to exist. It can be nurtured into form, but not created out of whole cloth."

"But that doesn't explain my situation with Severus, Professor," Hermione said. "I love him."

Dumbledore gently took her hand. "As you grow older, Miss Granger, you'll discover that there are many types of love. I'm sorry to say that desiring someone is not the most stable sort."

"What sort is, then?" she demanded, crossly, snatching her hand away. "The sort where I'm convinced that he needs me, the sort where I wake up and the only thing I really want to hear is the sound of his voice? The sort where I go to my classes the ways I do purely so I can get a chance to look at him?" Bitter tears were rolling down her face. "There's two differences in my case and other instances of this curse, sir. One of them we can't figure out, and that's why Severus is effected, too. The other one is that I love him - I can barely remember when I did not love him, at least in the way that little girls love."

Dumbledore gaped at her, then turned and looked at the others of her group, who were wearing expression of such myriad and mixed emotions that they looked almost comical. There was pride in them, for Hermione and her moments of taking a stand. There was revulsion - none of them thought much of Severus, after all. There was saddness to see her suffer so, support to defend her as she did, and anger there. He wondered how much of that was directed at him

Ron spoke up first. "It's true, sir. Hermione always spoke up for him - really fast, and all determined like she gets when she's not thinking logically. Forgive me, Hermione, but really. I remember she would snap at us so badly when we said things about him."

Hermione nodded. "I only half understood at the time," she said.

"When did this start?" Dumbledore asked, breathlessly.

Ginny sighed. "Probably the first night back to school in their fourth year - the night we met the guy who wasn't Moody. Hermione and I sat up talking all night, mostly about the end of second year - their third year. We were talking about how brave Ron and Harry were and then we got to talking about the adults, and the next thing you know, she was all silly about him."

"You were the one, then," said Dumbledore. "Your birthday was mid-September?"

"Yes. I turned 18."

"There is a crystal in my office that I've charmed to give me certain information when one of the students develops an inappropriate affection for one of the teachers. It went off for Severus that year, and stayed on every time he entered my office until he entered on your birthday.Did your situation change?"

"That was when I acknowledged the situation to myself. I told you I love him. The spell makes me a little silly when I'm tired, apparently, because I would never have said anything if I hadn't been up half the night learning to make a new portkey."

"Did it work?"

"I couldn't test it. It felt right. It's just like a code activated one, but it only works when the user wants it to."

"Brilliant, Miss Granger," said Dumbledore. "You'll have to show me later."

"Yes, sir," she said with a smile.

Dumbledore patted her hand and looked at them all fondly. "What do you think is the other difference?"

Luna smiled in that soft, ethereal way of hers and said, "He's in love with her, too."

Hermione sighed. "No, he's not, Luna. It's the spell - it back-lashed, somehow, so that both of us became caught. I was already in love, so it only made me more outrageous. Him, it gave the seed of the spell, and he believed my suggestion of the reason. Severus is emotionally crippled, and knows of love only as a theory, as something other people have. So he had nothing else to go on to explain the amorous feelings. He had to go on my interpretation." She put her face in her hands and started shaking.

"The seed of the spell," said Harry. "There was a Death Eater meeting in September, too." Nobody bothered to ask him how he knew. "That must have been when she cast the spell."

"I started having dreams," said Hermione in a ghostly, soft voice. "He irritated me so badly in Hogsmeade, and was having fun reading my anger. I just pictured..." she blushed crimson... "I just picked something different for him to read."

"Snape's a legilimens," Ron said.

"Professor Snape," said Harry, Dumbledore, and Hermione all at once.

"Fine. Professor Snape is a legilimens - the other guy's just an angry snob in the dungeons."

Ginny giggled. "Technically, he's an occlumens, Ron."

"No, they go hand in hand," said Dumbledore, then stopped. "He confessed to having used legilimency on you at some point, Miss Granger."

"Yeah," said Ron enthusiastically, "but what if it was while the spell was forming? It was taking over Hermione's mind and he was in there, so it climbed in to his, too."

"So the spell's working faster because it's working on both of us?" asked Hermione. "This says clearly six months, after all."

"Right," said Ron. "Because you were already in love with him, the other stuff just... erm... ugh... well..."

"Enhanced it," Luna said.

"Yuck," said Ginny. Hermione blushed a vivid crimson. "It explains the incident with the romance novel bed, though."

"Still doesn't explain about Professor Snape," said Neville. "If the spell only made him attracted to you... I mean to say..." He frowned, drew a deep breath, then began again, very fast. "Whybesonicetoyouwhenhecanjustseduceyou?"

Harry opened his mouth to say something, but stopped and gasped and slapped his hand to his forehead, swearing quietly under his breath.

Dobby the house-elf appeared at that exact moment. "Professor Dumbledore, sir, Professor Dumbledore, sir! Professor McGonagall is sending me to tell you that Professor Snape is escaping her, sir. Professor McGonagall is saying she is never guarding anyone else for you again, sir!" He handed Dumbledore a little black leather book and the piece of parchment attached to it, and then apparated away with a soft, delicate pop. Ginny and Ron wrestled Harry onto to the next bed, where he curled up and moaned in pain.

_"Dear Albus,"_ the note read, in Severus's jagged, spiky handwriting. _"I hope you will forgive me, someday, but I have to do this. Lucius repaid a debt to tell me that the Dark Lord will kill her if he thinks he can still learn something from her, so I have to go to him. I think I may survive although that, too, will be far from my own desires. I will tell him you lifted the spell with ease._

_"I realize she feels nothing for me, a distinct lack of sentiment for which she can scarcely be blamed. The dreams of a lifetime of happiness with her have changed my whole world, though, and I can scarcely imagine life without her. No harm will ever come to her while I still draw breath._

_"Please give her this book - I bought it for her in Stratford-on-Avon. Even if I never see her again, I will always love her in my dreams."_

She accepted the thin volume of poetry with limp and shaking hands, opening it to the first page and reading his note with evident confusion. "The dreams," breathed Hermione, tears rolling down her cheeks. "My God. They were real..."

* * *

Bellatrix brought him, with his hands tied in conjured ropes, to kneel at the feet of the Dark Lord. "I told you he was a treacherous fool, my Lord," she said.

"I'm not a traitor. Dumbledore took her away. I had to come tell you, my Lord. He lifted the spell with incredible ease. It meant nothing to him."

"Ah," purred Voldemort, "I use his own against him, and still he defeats me." He made a quick hand signal.

"Crucio," snapped Bellatrix, and the pain tore through Snape from his toes to the top of his head. He locked his jaw, and locked his throat and refused to cry out - she wanted it too much.

The senseless beating started then. He tried to protect his head, but Bellatrix looked at his neck and noticed the chain.

* * *

"No, he's lost his Order portkey," moaned Harry.

* * *

"Crucio," said Voldemort in a soft, sibilant whisper right next to his ear. The pain wracked his body. All he could think of was how much he wanted to see Hermione.

Then it was over. Voldemort himself lifted Snape to his feet and smiled "I'm sorry your mudblood escaped you, my Severus. It's plain to see that this spell isn't worth the wait. We'll have her killed for you at the first opportunity."

"No," he croaked, then caught himself. "Let me." He was weak, and the world was going black at the edges. The taste of iron in his mouth was all he needed to know to be sure that he was bleeding.

Bellatrix narrowed her eyes at him. "The spell is useless, my Lord," she agreed, "but for a different reason." Her hand lashed out and she slapped him, hard, across the face. "You're in love with her," she shrieked. "You fell in love with a filthy, wretched Gryffindor, a mudblood muggle-lover half your age." She spat on him. "Snape, I know sick, and you are one sick bastard."

"Thanks," he said, and was slapped again. "She's lying, my Lord."

* * *

"He knows," said Harry.

* * *

Voldemort came closer, and took his face in his hands, guiding Snape's eyes up to meet his closely. "Severus, you're brilliant," he said softly, "you are excellent at what you do." Getting punched by a sixty-five year old serpent man who preferred to use magic and to let others to do his violence for him was quite a repellent privilege.

"Did you think I could not tell this, my Severus? You can hide everything else from me, but I can see this. I know my enemies' fault, and I know it well. That foolish, pitiful emotion is a glaring beacon to me, I can smell its foul, reekingtaint anywhere. A grain no bigger than a mustard seed, in a heart so black as yours, Severus, would easily be enough without you dragging the fairy fluff of this endless, pathetic fantasy in here."

"Its Bella's damnable spell," he shouted, lying to save his own worthless life, if only briefly enough to be sure they would refuse to use the spell again. "It made me think ridiculous, impossible, revolting things. Please, my Lord, I only want to serve you."

"You only want to raise bushy-haired filthy half-blood babies with your tramp of a student," snapped Bella, and her back handedslap was enough to knock his off his feet. She turned her wand on him, them, using the cruciatus until he thought his ears would bleed just at the sound of her voice. "You could have loved me instead, Sev," she whispered.

"Never," he said. "If I have to love someone, I want to love a brave girl with a pure heart."

"That's just it," Bella screamed. "You didn't have to love anyone. The god-damned spell isn't supposed to create love, and it isn't supposed to effect you at all. You shouldn't be in love with her - you can't be in love with her."

* * *

"Oh Hermione," whispered Harry. "Oh, God, I'm so sorry, Hermione. He's going to..."

* * *

"But I am," he said, and felt almost healed as the knowledge of that truth poured over him. It wasn't magic they felt, either one of them. They were in love - really, truly in love and, if he had survived this day, they could have had all their lives to learn and share with each other what that kind of love really meant.

He looked down and the ring on his finger, and thought of her face when she gave it to him, then closed his eyes tightly. He wanted her face to be the very last thing he saw. He wished with all his heart that he could be with her, just one last time.

_"Just say my name, and you'll be with me."_ Her voice was soft and beautiful, drowning out the hideous noises and the pain of being dragged uncomfortably across the ground. If he wasn't horribly mistaken, the Dark Lord had decided to use an old muggle torture on him and burn him at the stake. Flame freezing charms didn't work when they took your wand and left you half-conscious. Yes, definitely. There were flames licking at his cloak, now, and the realization that this was the sensation cruciatus had been designed to mimick. The real thing was much worse.

_"Just say my name..."_

He smiled beautifically, and held on tight to the image of her face, reaching out in his mind to touch the air thatshe was."Hermione," he whispered, the most beautiful sound he knew. "Hermione, Hermione."

Suddenly, he was flying.

* * *

_And it's here we must leave them, good readers. I'll let you decide where he arrives._

_I wrote this story as a challenge, and it has been, but I've learned a lot from it, and I'm quite pleased with the outcome, and I hopeyou liked it, too. This is not my ship - I'm too arrogant to stick to a ship I actually believe in when looking for something hard to do. But it does make a lovely story when you're looking for the bitter sweet._

_The poem involved here is called "A Pavane for the Nursery", whichis also commonly known as "Touch the Air Softly" and is the priceless work of William Jay Smith. It is also available set to music. _

_Thank you all for the great reviews. Don't forget to review this chapter, too and yell and shriek at me for leaving it that way. I'll see you all tonight at the Potter parties._


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